Plague
by Nina Ridgmont
Summary: A virus sweeps through Europe, infecting both humans and vampires. Alec and Felix are stranded in the disease-ravaged Italy, trying to figure out their places in this world without the Volturi- if they can manage to survive. Rated T for character death, language, homosexual situations, violence, and bad science.
1. Chapter 1

Felix peered through the snow flurries. He was done waiting for the rest of the group to turn up. Unfortunately, His Highness didn't agree.

"What could be keeping them?" Alec muttered to himself, but the voice carried to Felix. The other Volturi was more vigilant in his search, seeking out every corner of the valley below. Despite the intensity of his scrutiny, Jane and Demitri had yet to appear.

Though Alec did not expect an answer, Felix provided one.

"What do you think is keeping them? They're fucking."

Alec's mouth drew into a frown. He had always been a prude, Felix knew, but the prudity especially flared up when the crude deed was applied to his sister. In all his three hundred plus years, Felix had never met anyone as priggish and as humorless as the Witch Twins. It was probably a genetic abnormality in their family.

At least Jane had mellowed some after she and Demitri ditched their passive aggressive flirting and finally got together. Not that she said anything remotely lighthearted, but now she would allow Felix to joke without treating him to one of her infamous scathing glares.

And Alec, who Felix had always thought of as the buffer of sanity between Jane and the rest of the world, had become dour and squeamish. Jane's union with Demitri must have set him mourning the loss of exclusivity to his sister.

There might be something to Heidi's theory of the Witch Twin's incestuous relationship, because, by Lucifer, this petty attitude was not normal.

"They know to meet us at Sabina's cabin," Felix argued. "They'll catch up with us later."

"What if they're in trouble?"

Felix heaved a sigh. "What trouble could they possibly run into that they couldn't handle between the two of them? Trust me, they're fucking."

Alec's frown deepened. He continued to scan the horizon for them.

"Look," Felix explained, as the last thread of his patience slowly began to unravel. "The cabin is right there." He thrust his hand towards the building within their vampire sight. "If Jane can find this spot, then she should be able to find the cabin right there. She and Demitri received the same directions we did. Do you not trust Jane's ability in finding her way from here to there with few hints from the directions?"

Alec's shoulders dropped. He must have finally clued in that Felix was close to throwing himself onto the snow-covered road, kicking and screaming. After a few silent seconds passed by, he decided, "Very well."

Felix almost sank into the snowdrift in happiness. Finally.

As they approached the cabin, Felix complained, "You need to do something about this pathological denial of yours. Jane's a big girl; she's free to fuck whoever she wants."

Alec did not even glance his way. "I accept it. It doesn't mean you need to say it."

"What? That Jane's fucking?" Playfully, Felix sang in a baritone. "Your sister's having se-"

He blacked out. When he came to, Alec was standing over him.

"Are you done?" Alec asked, a chilly edge to his voice.

"Sure," Felix grunted.

Alec held out his hand. Felix hesitated, not trusting the other vampire's motives, until he remembered that Alec had no sense of humor. He took it and Alec pulled him up, peeling him from the wet ground.

Alec whisked his hand away as soon as Felix was standing. An odd pressure lingered on Felix's hand. Reeling through his picture-perfect memory, it occurred to him that he and Alec had never touched before. Why that should strike him as noteworthy, Felix had no idea, except that the two had known each other longer than a natural human lifetime.

Alec had already parted open the door. "It doesn't look like she's in," he informed Felix.

"We'll wait then." Felix elbowed his way in.

The cabin was one room. A relatively modern stove range and refrigerator aligned one wall, while sparse living room furniture (two wooden chairs, a table, and a chest of drawers) stood in the opposite side. A furry rug covered the floor in the living room side. A circular wood-burning furnace occupied the center of the room.

The cabin offered few places to hide anything. Felix started searching the kitchen, peeking into the stove and the refrigerator. He kept an eye out for any signs that Sabina might not be following the Volturi's laws.

His ears registered a thump from the other side of the cabin. He swiveled around. Alec had perched on the chest of drawers.

"What are you doing?" Felix asked.

"Nothing."

A squeak allowed him to fix on the source of Alec's terror. A gray mouse hopped across the margin of the wooden floor.

"You're kidding" Felix groaned.

"I don't like rats."

"It's a mouse."

The mouse turned the corner, scampering towards the drawers. Alec crawled back, sending a metal cup crashing to the floor.

"By Lucifer . . ." Felix grabbed a poker and punched the blunt end into the mouse's skull. "There. It's dead."

Alec remained in his huddle. "There'll be more," he said hoarsely.

"So? They'll just stay in their hidey hole."

Alec tightened his huddle.

Felix tromped over to the wall, inspecting it for any crack big enough for a mouse to slip through. A rustle of legs alerted him to the rest of the mouse family. He tore off a bigger hole and smashed in every moving body in the nest.

A still silence hung over as they listened for any possible survivors. After several minutes, or so it seemed to Felix, he announced, "Okay, that's the last of them."

Alec slowly lowered his legs to the floor. He propped himself with his arms on the top of the chest of drawers. When he released his hold on the wooden edge and his legs did not crumple under him, Felix quipped, "I guess that means that trip to Disneyland is off."

The joke was meant to restore everything to normal, and it had succeeded, if Alec's familiar withering glare was any sign. "Shouldn't they be here by now?" he asked.

Back on that track again.

The cabin had no windows, so Alec was staring intently at the door. Felix plopped onto the carpet. Its soft hairs tickled at his neck. He gazed up at the ceiling, at the crossbeams and the white rectangles divided between them. Cracks zigzagged across the paint in the ceiling.

In his previous life as a human, Felix had an interest in the shape of the earth. He wanted to study far mountain ranges and canyons and volcanoes. Back then, men with those ideas were considered crackpots; he was well before interest in the field boomed. But he had never really thought of earth formations as a science. He just liked the idea that the planet was constantly developing and changing.

"What are you looking at?" Alec asked. This tone of voice was different to what Felix was used to hearing from him. No demanding or rebuffing. Just curiosity.

"I'm looking for seismic activity in the cracks of the ceiling," Felix blurted, not really thinking about what his answer would sound like.

"You can do that?"

"To a degree. I think machines provide a more accurate reading, even for us. Seismic activity appears anywhere on Earth, but as there are no fault lines here, I suppose the biggest vibrations are caused by avalanches."

Felix listened to the floor groan as Alec settled onto the carpet next to him, to get a better look at what fascinated him. He did not to move, lest he upset the tenuous peace between them. He even entertained a wild hope that Alec would burst out with an exclamation: "I see them," but he resigned himself to the truth that the visions in the ceiling cracks were his alone.

At least the other vampire was not denouncing his hobby as dumb or useless.

Rather, Alec seemed to put an earnest effort into studying the ceiling. All the stress the house endured, they could see. Even humans could see a good portion of them and derive a history from them.

Felix lay still about an hour, his most taxing interval spent in silence. He was sure Alec could lie still for weeks without feeling the itch to move. He almost envied that ability at that moment. Nevertheless, Felix's disdain for quiet returned.

He reached over and poked Alec's shoulder. A zing of unreality coursed through him as he recalled his earlier revelation of how they had never touched until that day. What an utter waste. Alec had not moved. He could be dead - or deader. Felix rose to his elbow. Alec blinked, but otherwise held perfectly still.

Felix leaned in closer. He was testing himself on how close he could get before Alec moved. Felix's face hovered a couple of inches over Alec's. Still no movement. Felix pushed through to the final barrier. He placed his lips against the other boy's.

Alec moved. His mouth opened, allowing Felix to ravish it. Felix coaxed him up. He always enjoyed getting a response out of Alec, with his jokes and his innuendos. This was much better than any of them.

The cabin door swung open; only then did Alec shove Felix off. Felix zipped to a stand and faced an irate Sabina.

"What did you do to my wall?"

Sabina had cooled down by the time Jane and Demitri deigned to arrive.

Felix had already explained the damage to the wall. "Searching for hiding places," he had said smoothly. "Lucky for you, all that was in there was mice."

Sabina had left the Volturi a year ago, to strike out as a hermit, or some rot that was beyond Felix's comprehension. He could not imagine preferring the perpetual solitude of the mountains to the center of action in Volterra.

Aro had allowed her to leave, provided she endure the periodic checkups of the Volturi guards to ensure she was not doing anything illegal - like sharing her true identity with humans or raising vampire children.

He asked how she was hunting.

"Lots of people get lost in avalanches," Sabina commented. "Especially at this time of year. Even with today's technology, people still get lost."

Throughout this, Alec had not said a word. Only Jane seemed to notice her brother was acting any different than usual.

After they left the cabin, Jane sidled up to Alec. "Did anything happen while you were waiting?" she asked.

Felix overheard. He paused in anticipation for Alec's answer.

"No," Alec said, in his usual serious tone. "Nothing."


	2. Chapter 2

On the premise of reporting to Aro their findings, Alec arrived back at Volterra early.

Nobody believed his premise, except maybe Demitri. (Felix would have believed it if he had not been . . . involved, but Alec refused to think of that.) But for once, flight was the better option. If he spent too much more time with Jane, she would figure it all out. He could not predict what her reaction would be when she found out, but suffice to say, she would overreact.

Alec could not deal with overreacting; he needed underreacting, something he would not find anywhere among the Volturi except in his own solitude.

Gianna was not at her desk. Alec was pleased; no one would announce his arrival. He need not pay audience with Aro, Caius and Marcus. He need not testify to Aro about the recent events through his touch. Though why he feared Aro's knowledge of what he did with Felix was laughable, as Aro already knew things about him that were much worse -things that he never wanted anyone to know, even Jane. Felix's kiss hardly rated among them.

Alec just needed one day to figure things out for himself. It was difficult to think now, when everything was in a jumble, when Jane's reaction (and consequently Felix's well -being) depended much on how he addressed it.

Felix may be a crude bastard but he hardly deserved the wrath Jane could deliver upon him.

Just one day and he would know what to do.

A few hours later and he made no progress. He sat at the two-seated table in muted disgust and watched out the window at the cold gray sky. The sky was similar to the one that roofed Sabina's valley in Switzerland. Looking at the same sky, Alec thought Switzerland not far enough away for comfort.

He heard his door scrape open.

He propped himself to a stand. He had not expected anyone to learn of his presence here before he was ready to emerge, but doubtless they had. Secrets had a short life expectancy in this place. He prayed it was not Aro.

Gianna shuffled in, walking as if lopsided. She was a sickly pale, the dimness of the room providing a greenish tint to her parched complexion.

"I need you to change me," Gianna pleaded.

"You know I can't do that," Alec replied, apologetic. Aro had a certain order to the humans that would change into vampires, and no one was to interfere with it. To do so would be as grave as to tell a human about the existence of vampires. Aro had to ensure that his human charges were committed to the Volturi before he changed them. Since the wars of the American South, he took care not to acquire any rebellious newborns.

Alec iterated, "The rules . . ."

"Fuck the rules," Gianna screeched. "You promised. I need to change now."

She grabbed a small knife from his table and dragged the blade across her purple veined wrist.

Alec flared in annoyance at Gianna's treating him like a common newborn (did she really think he had so little control that he would pounce at the first bleeding wound?), but that instantly faded as a foul odor seeped out with her blood. Not even the most impulsive newborn could be induced to drink this blood. Something was wrong with her.

"Gianna . . ."

She stared back at him. A strange, yellow glint ringed her eyes.

Alec strode over to his wardrobe and yanked out a shirt. He tore it and wrapped one of the makeshift rags over her wrist to slow the bleeding.

"We need to see Aro," he told her.

Gianna followed him willingly, possibly thinking he was going to ask Aro permission to change her sooner. Alec felt bad about the subterfuge, but if he explained his real reason, she might put up a fuss.

He entered Aro's chamber. He, Caius, and Marcus were at their thrones, engaging in some light talk. Alec did not know how to broach this issue of Gianna's illness, but he had no need to wonder. Their talk stopped once they saw Gianna in this condition.

"Father," Alec bowed, but Aro sped over, thrusting up a hand to signal his brothers not to approach them. He placed his hand on Gianna's unbloody wrist and turned it over. A web of purple veins spread across this wrist, too. They appeared like a rash.

"I see you encountered no one on the way here," Aro acknowledged, almost as if in praise of Alec's good sense. "Have the others returned with you?"

Alec realized Aro was talking about Jane, Demitri and Felix. The events that he had dreaded sharing seemed so long ago that he wondered why he ever worried about them.

"No, Father."

"I'm sick," Gianna pleaded. "I need to change now."

It relieved Alec that Gianna was sound enough to know she was sick, but Aro and his brothers were not mollified.

"Unfortunately, my dear, you will not change after all," Aro gently.

Gianna trembled. "You promised," she repeated. "You promised you would. You promised."

"It's out of our control," Aro kept his gentle tone. Alec's dread returned. Aro explained softly, just to his hearing, "This is one condition that vampirism cannot cure."

Tears that smelled just as foul as her blood ran down Gianna's face.

"What's wrong with me?" When Aro did not answer, she looked at Alec. Her eyes shone pleadingly.

Alec knew what Aro would do next. He told Gianna, "You won't feel it." It was all he could promise her. When Aro cupped his hands around her neck, Alec sent a numbing spell over her. She fell limp just before Aro twisted her neck.

Aro turned to Alec, full of instructions. "I'll dispose of the body. Return to your room and stay there until someone summons you. Take the underground passage so you do not encounter anyone. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Father." Questions piled into Alec's head, but Aro would not permit them to be voiced.

"We will send a message that Jane and the others will not return to Volterra until the danger is passed," Aro ordered to his brothers.

As Alec hurried to the passage, he heard Aro mutter, "It's good that he found her first."

He had gotten the solitude he wanted, but it was of no use. All he could think about was Gianna's tear filled eyes, pleading for him to save her.

Nevertheless, he waited, as Aro had instructed.


	3. Chapter 3

Felix and the others had received the message by telegram when they stopped in Geneva. Felix supposed that to Aro and his brothers, the telegram was a newfangled contraption, and they should be lucky Aro had not chosen to communicate to them by slave runner, or however the Ancient Romans sent long distance messages.

The message was a cryptic as it was insistent. "Do not return home. Will send for you when danger has passed." That the message coincided with news reports on the Italian news outlets about some plague that started in that area was just a coincidence. Vampires need not worry about human diseases. Or so Demitri loudly repeated to Jane.

He failed at persuading her.

"Alec is in there." Jane stated.

"He'll be fine."

"No. There's something about this disease . . . Aro mentioned that there was a plague that affected vampires. It was before our time. He said that if the Black Plague had not affected vampires as well, that European humans could have become extinct."

"When did he say that?" Felix asked.

Jane looked through him, as if she could not believe he asked an intelligent question instead of joking. "Before you joined. In the 17th century sometime." She stood up from her chair and started for the exit of the tavern where they sheltered for the day. "I'm going there."

A long argument ensued, until they finally worked out that Felix would check on Volterra alone. If Jane discovered anything bad happened to Alec, she would kill Felix. If Demitri went to Volterra and anything bad happened to him, Jane would kill Felix. If Alec was fine but learned that Felix and Demitri had endangered his sister, he would kill both of them. The best way to ensure that the fewest killings resulted from this mission would be for Felix to go by himself.

Felix departed immediately. Honestly, Jane's worry about a disease that likely only affected humans. . . . this could not be how ordinary siblings behaved. Felix had once had siblings. Was it different with twins? Whatever it was, he raved to himself, it was not normal.

So maybe Felix was a little worried himself. If he reined in his impulse to torment Alec, all four of them would have been safely holed up in Geneva. He refused to take all the blame for it though; Alec did not have to run away like some scandalized blushing virgin.

Soon enough, he reached Volterra.

The town was cordoned off by a bio team but when he slipped through the barriers he found it empty, save for some corpses. If there were any human survivors, they must have evacuated.

He entered the palazzo. A few vampires lay in sight, gazing stonily through bright yellow eyes at him. Felix was not sure if they were dead; something warned him not to get to close to find out.

He searched through the main hall. He looked for any living - or at least functioning - vampires around and saw only corpses. It was not until he peeked into the courtroom and saw Aro, Caius and Marcus at their thrones, with the same stiff, glazed stares out of bright yellow eyes, that the enormity of the plague hit him.

"Lucifer!" This was bad! Felix was hyperventilating like a human, and he was not sure that he wanted to breathe too deeply in the palazzo. When he volunteered to go to Volterra alone, he never prepared himself for anything this bad. This was too big. The chances that Alec escaped this were narrowing to zero.

Jane was going to kill him.

Nevertheless, he had not spotted Alec yet, either alive or in corpse form, and he could not leave until he knew what happened.

He headed up the stairs to the bedchambers.

The halls were empty. They seemed to twist eerily in the short distance to Alec's door. The door was usually shut, whether he was in or not, so that marked no significance. Perhaps Alec had not returned to the palazzo after all, but had retreated to one of his numerous hiding places that no one but Jane knew about. But at that moment, opening that door was the last thing he wanted to do.

He knocked.

Volturi members did not knock. Aro had never placed much importance on the luxury of personal privacy. Felix had come to associate knocking on doors with cowardice. Hell, like it mattered. No one was around to witness . . .

The door opened.

Alec materialized. Felix gave into the insane urge to grab him and hug him, he was so glad to find someone that was still alive. But when he stepped towards the other vampire, Alec jumped back.

"Did Aro send for you?" he asked blandly.

Felix restrained his emotional overspill. "In a sense," he finally replied. "What happened here?"

"Gianna died."

Felix entered, checking the other vampire carefully. Except for the hungry black discs that encompassed his eyes, he seemed fine. His heart lifted. Jane wouldn't kill him after all.

Alec stared back, clearly uncomfortable under Felix's intense scrutiny. Felix tore his gaze away and asked, "How did she die?"

"She was sick. Her blood was foul," Alec answered mechanically. "Aro had to kill her. Then he sent me up here. I'm supposed to wait up here until he says it's all right to come out."

Felix slumped on the chair by his writing table. "And you're not sick?"

"No. Don't touch that!" Alec shouted as Felix's hand wandered to the knife lying on top of the table.

Felix withdrew his hand.

Alec added, more calmly. "I think whatever Gianna had is catching to vampires. That's why Aro ordered me to remain up here, so I don't spread it to others."

"It's a little late for that," Felix commented wrily.

A shadow overtook Alec's face. "What do you mean?" he asked, even though he must suspect.

When Felix did not answer, Alec rushed to the door. Hell. Felix raced after him, knocking over the writing table and chair. He must not see the scene downstairs.

He got there too late. Alec had dashed for the throne room and froze at the sight of his surrogate parents in their death poses.

Felix yanked him back down the hall, away from the gruesome sight.

"Jane . . . " he squeaked out, when he resurfaced from his shock.

"Jane and Demitri are back in Geneva. Felix assured him, relieved to be able to impart good news at last. "They are safe."

Alec did not move.

"Were you in your room the whole time?" Felix asked.

"Aro ordered me . . ." the other vampire said hollowly. He decided not to finish his explanation.

"Okay," Felix plotted. "We need to leave. There's no food here. And by here, I mean anywhere in Volterra."

"We can't. It'll spread . . ."

"It's already spread," Felix argued, exasperated, forgetting this was still news to Alec. "Don't worry. We won't seek out Jane and Demitri right away, if you're worried about them catching it. But we need to find food, and we need to leave Volterra to do it."

Alec deliberated over this. Just like back at the cabin. Finally, he agreed. "Fine."


	4. Chapter 4

On the way out, Felix nicked a cell phone off one of the corpses. This one was covered in a plastic sleeve, thus was somewhat protected from germs. As soon as the two left the town limits, he dialed Jane's number.

Jane picked up instantly. "Well?"

For once, Felix did not badger her for niceties. "Alec is fine."

"Let me talk to him."

Felix handed over the phone.

"Jane?" Alec asked. He cupped his hand over the mouth end of the phone. "I'll return in a minute," he told Felix, then strode out of Felix's hearing range.

Felix snorted. So apparently, even though he had taken the effort to reunite the Prude Twins, he did not qualify enough to overhear their intimate conversation. It was fortunate the plague missed both of them. Felix did not want to think about what state he would have to deal with if one of them had perished.

Except for the vampires that had mated, none of the Volturi had a connection like Alec and Jane. He could hardly fathom that type of bond, where all was fine even if the external world could descend into madness (like it just did), so long as those individuals remained intact. The flip side of it made Felix thankful he had no such bond. Too much of a burden. Though Demitri and Heidi were his friends, and he felt grateful for the former's survival and mourned the latter's passing, he would survive those bonds being broken.

Bored with standing still, he prowled over to the area where Alec had wandered. Alec was still talking; he must have told Jane everything that happened in Volterra. (At least Felix did not have to do that.) As Felix approached, Alec cut the call short.

"Jane? I have to go. I'll call back soon." A pause. "I love you too."

Felix puckered his lips and made loud kissing noises as Alec hung up. He turned to face Felix. "Grow up."

Felix grinned, but an awkward silence fell over them. The horror of the discovery had distracted them well from the other day's encounter. But now, with the plague's devastation out of sight, the issue reared up.

Alec swiftly turned away. "I'm going to get something to eat," he muttered.

Felix followed him anyway, though Alec's cold tone did not invite him to. He did not have anything else to do.

They descended the mountain, taking almost an hour because Alec was in no particular hurry. He walked slowly deliberately, so that Felix would lose patience and take off without him. It had not worked; Felix remained glued at his side, uttering no complaints about the slow pace. He seemed reluctant to strike out alone. The Volturi's demise must have shaken him more than he let on.

The occasional car marked their route, but not until they reached the Ponte della Maddalena did they encounter any living humans.

A honey blonde woman dawdled at the tributary bank. The human dressed in nice clothes, which indicated that her venture into the country was unplanned. The car within sight smelled like hers, but it also bore the scents of several other humans. So she may not have travelled alone.

Finally Felix hissed, "What are you waiting for?"

"Do you smell that?" Alec asked.

Felix concentrated his nose. He smelled healthy human blood. He also smelled a pungency reminiscent of the closed off space of Alec's room.

"So. She's not sick, but someone else is," Felix said. "I think she's safe to eat."

"Where is it coming from?"

"Maybe she stole the car and stuffed the owner in the car boot."

"What?" Alec protested. "That makes no sense." Not that it mattered to him where the human came from, so there was no reason to get caught up in Felix's nonsensical argument.

The girl's head pivoted in their direction. Though unable to hear anything from that distance, she must have sensed she was being watched.

"Tonio?" she called.

Then she wasn't alone.

Alec let his thirst emerge. He had promised Jane he would be careful, but it had been too long since he had anything to eat and the fetid smell was not coming from her. He snatched her and drank quickly. The blood sated his suddenly dry throat.

Another human - Tonio - lurked nearby and Felix dashed for him, uttering "My turn," in a voice inaudible to humans as he passed by Alec, like he was playing a game. The male appeared briefly from the woods only to disappear.

Alec carried the empty human to the secluded area where Felix claimed his meal. He dropped the girl beside her beau and picked his lighter out of his pocket.

Felix, catching sight of the lighter, tilted his head to the side. "We don't have to do that now," he observed.

"Don't have to do what?" Alec asked, not understanding - or trusting - whatever Felix was referring to.

"We don't have to burn the remains."

"Yes we do." It was what they have always done; it was what Aro taught them to do. For once Alec was sorry he did not have Jane's power. He could have slammed it on Felix for such insolence.

"Nobody's going to look," Felix argued. "Nobody's going to get close enough to look. They'll just be another pair of dead bodies."

Alec lowered the lighter to the corpses and incinerated them.

He wandered back to the bridge, Felix trailing after him like a desperate sheepdog. He wanted to look at the car again. Maybe they could take it. (Yes, they; he was kindly including Felix in his short term future.) Though if they were going nowhere in particular, they had no need for a car, but the boot might contain some things they could use.

Another human couple had already flocked to the car. They spotted Alec and Felix before the vampires could retreat back to the woods. At once, the source of diseased smell became apparent. It wafted from the male.

"Scusa," the girl asked, in badly butchered Italian. She had an American accent. Her question roughly translated to "Have you seen these people?" then described the couple Alec and Felix just finished off.

The sky was overcast, but Alec remained by the trees, in case the sun should peek out at that very moment. Felix, naturally, did not entertain such worries. Shoving himself in front of Alec, he offered, in English, "Your friends are missing?"

The girl smiled in relief. "They speak English," she said melting against her boyfriend. Louder, she answered, "Yes, our friends. Tonio and Melina."

Felix lowered his head. "There were some bodies out by the creek. I don't know if it was your friends; we didn't want to get too close."

"It couldn't be them," the boy told the girl. "It wouldn't have hit them that fast."

"Let's go," Alec urged Felix, but Felix ignored him

"According to the news, it might," the girl replied. "Isn't that why the British news was calling it The Surprise Virus?"

The boy tossed up his hands, downtrodden.

"Felix," Alec hissed. "He's infected."

"I know that. But she's not."

"Not yet." But he might as well have spoken to air. Felix marched forth, towards the road and the infected human and her mate. He stopped at the edge, letting the car barricade him from the diseased human. He exhibited that much sense, at least.

"Where are you coming from?" Felix asked.

"Florence," the man returned. "But we were visiting friends in Arezzo when the plague hit and they're not letting anyone in the city."

The girl squinted at Felix.

"Your eyes are red," she said.

Alec bit back a groan. Idiot.

"I'm an Albino," Felix explained. He had insisted once before that when he ran into a group of humans, he had used that excuse. He also insisted the humans had accepted it, despite his obviously melanin-enriched dark hair.

"You are not," the girl said.

"I think we'd better leave," the boy urged his mate. "That might be a symptom."

"The sufferers didn't have red eyes, Vincent," the woman said. "And neither do albinos. That's just a myth."

"Is it now?" Felix prodded. Alec could easily picture that humorous smile plastered to the bigger vampire's face.

The girl squared her torso at him. "I've studied genetic diseases," she retorted.

"Let's just go," Vincent suggested again. This time, he seemed spurred less by the possibility of Felix being diseased than the fact that his girlfriend was flirting with him.

"I find it curious," Felix announced, "that your beau is so anxious to get away from me when he's the one carrying the disease."

The news struck the human couple as utterly tactless. Identical grimaces crossed their wary faces.

"Is that a joke?" Vincent asked.

"You mean you couldn't tell?" Felix asked. "We could smell it from all the way over there." He gestured back to the woods, from where Alec watched them.

The girl jumped, as if noticing Alec for the first time.

Vincent started towards Felix. Felix dodged back, enraging the human even more with his exaggerated concern of infection. Before any more could come of the fight, though, Alec sent out a numbing spell, and Vincent collapsed, unconscious.

The girl screamed hoarsely and ran to her mate. "Vincent!" she cried.

Alec reluctantly left the shelter of the trees and joined them. "He's alive," he assured the girl. For the next couple of hours at least, he refrained from saying out loud.

The girl lifted her head. She stared up at them. "Were you telling the truth? Is he infected?"

"Do you doubt our word?" Felix asked, which was possibly the most idiotic thing he had ever spoken. This girl did not know them, and they were human eating vampires.

Alec knelt and turned over Vincent. Taking care to touch the human as little as possible, he lifted the shirtsleeve off the wrist. The webbed rash, similar to what had showed on Gianna, was beginning to faintly emerge.

"You've seen the victims," he asked, guessing at her medical experience. "They had this rash, right?"

The girl nodded. Alec dropped the arm back in place, and went off to the creek to wash off whatever traces of virus he might have picked up. He left Felix to deal with the girl's hysteria.


	5. Chapter 5

The girl cried for a long time. Felix tried to console her. "He's not dead yet."

"It's not a good sign," the girl acknowledged, wiping at her eyes. "Once the rash appears, the symptoms escalate."

Curiously, Felix smelled no trace of the disease coming from her. She had spent all this time glommed to an infected human. Either the disease's smell was hidden until just before the symptoms presented, or the disease passed her by entirely.

He still knew almost nothing about it. The media called it the Surprise Virus and one of the final symptoms was a dark lividity in the skin. That was about it. He did not even know how the disease transmitted from person to person - or vampire to vampire. Or whether there was a difference between the two species.

"What's your name?" he asked the girl.

"Chloe."

"I'm Felix." He did not proffer his hand for a handshake, as humans normally did, but neither did she.

She sniffled. Glancing over at the creek, where Alec waited and scowled at Felix's foolishness, she remarked, "Your friend doesn't seem to like me much."

"He doesn't like anyone."

"Where are you from?" Chloe asked, returning the question Felix asked of them

"Volterra," Felix admitted.

"Oh, that explains it."

An uneasy twinge crawled in Felix. "Hmm."

With her watery eyes, Chloe did not seem to notice Felix's surprise. "Melina, our host, said that Volterra has a reputation for oddness."

Ordinarily that would be all it took for Aro to call for heads to roll, but Aro and the Volturi, for all essential purposes, were gone. Also Chloe was unsure of what this oddness was supposed to be, and Melina was no longer around to inform her.

So Felix said casually. "I guess after you're there a while, you don't notice it much."

He dared glance back at Alec, only to find him farther down the creek. "Excuse me," he said, and ran, at a forced human pace, to Alec.

Felix caught up, but Alec did not slow down. "Are you leaving?"

"Of course," Alec answered. "But if you want to stay and make friends with the Food, by all means, don't let me stop you."

He kept his eyes away from Felix as he spoke. If Felix did not know better, he could have sworn Alec was jealous that Felix devoted his attention to that girl.

"So you're just going to go off on your own?'" Felix whined.

Alec finally turned to face him. "Being alone does not scare me. Not like it does you."

"Really? You can even live without Jane?" Felix baited. He tensed for retribution, which one of them always delivered if they got the slightest whiff of insult towards the other. Just as the words left his mouth, Felix realized he needed that. He needed Alec in a rage. He had just proved Alec's assertion. The demise of the Volturi had scared him shitless, and he needed to hang onto whatever was left of the coven.

But Alec did not rise to the bait. "So long as I know she's safe, I could," he replied, and despite the disturbing sincerity in his tone, Felix did not believe him. The ponce was just wallowing in his own self pity, that was all; everyone knew the Witch Twins always accompanied each other on their missions because they could not stand to be separated.

"You're a fucking hypocrite," Felix declared. That, too, failed to provoke Alec, who turned away like he could not be bothered to defend himself. Felix remembered that his opinion did not matter at all. He wasn't Jane, the object of Alec's unhealthy obsessive incestuous love. And Alec judged him, just because he was chatting with a human so he could find out a little more about this disease that could well kill them.

"Felix?" Chloe called out in a strained panic.

Felix looked over.

Vincent had revived, and he was spewing fetid blood.

Felix dashed over, not concealing his true speed this time, and pulled Chloe a couple of feet away. She fought him, but he would not chance her getting infected through Vincent's blood.

It did not just come out of his mouth; it oozed out his nose, his ears, his eyes and other openings that Felix refrained from mentioning in delicate company. Vincent hemorrhaged at an alarming rate; before long, the five quarts lay in a rancid puddle on the ground. His spasms stopped. There was no question that he was dead.

Alec approached the body, stopping short of detritus the disease left of the human. At least Gianna was spared that, he thought grimly.

Felix clamped his hands on Chloe's arms. Chloe positioned forward, keeping up her hopeless struggle to break free and run to her mate's body.

"I'm sorry," Felix said. "Is there anything we can do?"

She sagged within his hold and shook her head.

Felix released his grip. He hovered close to her, in case she made another wild lunge for the body. She sank to her knees.

"We should go," Alec mentioned. They already wasted enough time tending to these humans.

Chloe sprang back up. "You're leaving me?" she screeched.

"We don't have to leave," Felix pondered.

"It's too much of a risk," Alec reasoned. Felix sympathized with the girl too much. Alec sympathized with her too, but the Volturi discouraged these attachments. Humans were food and vampires should not lose their hearts to a human any more than humans should lose their hearts to a pig destined for the slaughterhouse.

"You can't just leave me here alone," Chloe pitched in an ear-ringing whine. "I could go with you. I could be useful. I'm studying to be a doctor. Just please don't leave me here alone."

Felix allowed a humorous smirk. Chloe had no idea that she was begging to keep company with two predators. Felix thought the whole thing hilarious, but Alec just found it annoying. She should realize she should be grateful they were letting her live this long.

Felix leaned away from Chloe. In a voice inaudible to the human, he suggested, "We could use a backup meal."

Alec relented. He did not really care. The girl would be dead within hours, one way or the other.

"You have the same red eyes," Chloe observed as they trekked south. "Are you brothers?"

"Sort of," Felix answered. Rather than giving full answers, he was letting Chloe draw her own conclusions.

"And you came from Volterra? Is it blocked off, like Florence?"

"No. But there's nothing there any more."

"Oh." Chloe faltered with her yammering. "I'm sorry. Was your family there?"

Alec halted. "Look," he cut in. "We agreed to let you tag along. We did not agree to share the details of our personal lives."

The girl flushed with embarrassment. "I was just making conversation," she said defensively.

Felix aimed a warning frown at him. He would side with Food's right to talk, as it was one of Felix's favorite activities. It would never occur to him that Chloe was the rude one for prying into their personal thoughts. That was how she showed her gratitude for not being ditched.

Felix intervened. "Do you think this is happening elsewhere?"

"I only know what I heard on my phone before my battery ran out," Chloe admitted. "My battery ran down two days ago."

Felix retrieved the phone he had pocketed.

"You had a phone all this time?" Chloe asked, heaving gasps of surprise.

"It's not ours, so I don't know what apps are included." The phone chimed cheerily as Felix pressed the power button.

"Don't let the power run down," Alec warned anxiously. That phone was the only means for Jane and Demitri to contact them.

"I know that," Felix snorted. Vampires were not supposed to naturally snort, yet, years ago Felix thought it worth the effort to perfect his for comic entertainment. The body functions that most individuals were glad to rid themselves of, Felix sought to recover. Thankfully, he had only perfected the snort.

He angled the phone to cast for the best signal. They succeeded; the news blared through. Chloe gave a shout of triumph and tugged Felix down to the ground. They sat and watched the newscasters explain that northern Italy was under quarantine.

Alec heard the newscast. The anchor, from a station in New York, sounded almost gleeful as he recounted the spread of a "real life Andromeda Strain." Outbreaks had been reported all over Europe and Africa. International flights were grounded, and the U. S. Center of Disease Control had initiated an alert for citizens to avoid public places for the time being.

A panicked expert appeared at the corner of the screen as she listed the signs and symptoms of the Surprise Virus: yellow ringed eyes, a purple veiny rash (which was particularly visible on the inner arm), and, at the end, a total hemorrhage of blood. The expert reiterated the warning that the signs and symptoms did not emerge until the end of an incubation period of up to seventy-two hours. The virus was most likely transmitted through blood or body fluids, so people should take precautions with bodily contact, even if they did not appear sick.

Alec folded his hand into his coat, recalling Gianna's blood oozing through his shirt as he bandaged her cut. He tried to count back the days that he had waited in his room until Felix showed up, but they blurred together. He was sure it had been longer than seventy-two hours.

Then Aro's strange comment sifted in his head. "It was fortunate that you found her."

"How long has it been since . . ." The heavy kiss in Sabina's cabin brushed out every other intelligible thought.

Felix was silent, a rarity. "Since we were at Sabina's?" he clarified after a pause. "Six or seven days. Why?"

The virus had missed him. He was only exposed to Gianna's blood for a couple of minutes. The others must have received the virus through their feedings. During that time Aro had ordered him to remain in his room, he had not joined the others for their meals. His encounter with Gianna was a fluke, and he had avoided any other chance of exposure in his seclusion.

Felix closed the news story and shut off the phone. Beside him, Chloe propped her elbows over her knees, posing in contemplative silence.

The virus transmitted by blood; it explained how the Volturi might have picked it up. The oddity in this disease lay in the fact that they had contracted the disease at all. Vampires did not contract AIDS or West Nile or other blood borne illnesses from the humans they ate. Then there was Alec's question. How many days had it been since that haunting kiss? Surely, Alec had kept track. The only reason that would matter was if . . .

Felix jumped up. "Wait, you weren't asking because Gianna bled on you?" he boomed.

Chloe cringed, possibly because he had shouted in her ear. Alec's expression did not so much as twitch.

"She cut her wrist. I bandaged it."

"Lucifer!" Felix paced to the edge of the road and back. "You're just determined to have Jane slaughter me, aren't you?"

An indecipherable flicker lit in Alec's eyes.

"Who is Jane?" Chloe asked, in an attempt to defuse Felix's rage.

"My sister," Alec said shortly.

Chloe bounced her head to Felix, then back to Alec. "Wouldn't that make her Felix's sister too?" Then with a belated sense of caution, she asked, "Or would that be a forbidden question about your personal life."

"It would be."

"It bloody well is not a secret," Felix snapped.

"It's not her business," Alec started to say.

"It is if you're going to fight over it," Chloe interrupted. "Call me weird, but I have this pet peeve of people having arguments over my head."

"If you don't like it, you're welcome to leave."

"Besides," Chloe stressed to Felix, "if you're certain about it being six days, and he hasn't presented any symptoms, then he should be clean."

Felix closed his eyes for a minute. He was not placing much faith in 'should' in regards to this disease.

"Gianna came to me the day after I left Sabina's," Alec informed him. "So you needn't worry about Jane killing you."

The rock hard tension in Felix's shoulders loosened. He should not have gotten riled up about Gianna's blood from ages ago, but he really, really did not want to get killed by Jane.


	6. Chapter 6

Night had fallen hours ago, and Chloe's yawns alerted them to her human fatigue.

This pretending to be human business was a constant hassle. Earlier, Chloe had split some bread and cheese she and Vincent had bought at the market in Arezzo. Felix actually ate some of it, while Alec tore off pieces and crumbled them into the ground.

Now, because the Food was tired, they had to quit their mindless wandering and pretend to go to sleep.

"You choose the spot," Felix offered, lifting up Chloe's hand and leading her into the woods.

"I'm not particular," Chloe said, as she stumbled to a cushy mound of dirt. She took off her cardigan and plumped it to a pillow, then twisted her hair in a makeshift ponytail. Felix grinned as he watched her ministrations.

Alec claimed his own spot on the ground: close enough to hear her pulse rate change as she passed through various levels of sleep, and no closer. Felix removed his coat and spread it over the shivering girl's shoulders, then he plopped down between them.

For a while, there was no sound from them except Chloe's tiny breaths.

Once assured that she was asleep, Felix turned over on his side and poked Alec's arm. It required all of Alec's willpower not to jostle away.

"Why do you keep doing that?" he asked in a low voice.

"Just making sure you're still awake." Felix jabbed him again.

"Of course I'm still awake."

"Shhh." Felix whispered sternly. "You wake her up and our fun time is over."

What fun time? Alec supposed it was only another of Felix's non sequiturs. He rose to a sit and peered at Chloe, who had curled to her side.

Felix lifted his head, following Alec's curious glance.

"I miss that." he commented. When Alec did not reply, he added "Sleeping. Or more specifically dreaming. I used to get my best ideas in dreams."

"Like what?"Alec asked, his guard inexplicably lowered. The same thing happened in Sabina's cabin, said the warning at the back of his head, but he did not let that deter him. This contemplative side of Felix was a refreshing change from his usual barbaric jokes and innuendos.

"Like how everything moves or changes. How the earth is not just a rock suspended in space. It acts on its own accord. It's amazing, actually."

Alec wondered why this side of Felix had not come up until recently. He never thought Felix was dumb, merely uninspired in his interests.

Why would Felix hide it? True, the Volturi did not approve of fanciful ideas of the cosmos, but neither did they approve of bawdy jokes, and Felix had not felt the need to hold back on those.

Felix, apparently no longer inclined to ponder the workings of the world, poked at Alec's thigh. A strange tingle danced up his leg. Alec straightened his body against the ground, as if shifting position would make the tingle go away.

Felix would not let it. After several more pokes, he placed a firmer grasp around Alec's thigh. An electric sensation rushed through Alec's dead veins. Felix stroked his hand up the short distance to his hip.

Alec closed his eyes. Though he understood some of what the sensation was, he did not identify it in his mind. His mind shut out all thoughts, leaving room only for the heady feel of Felix's large hand.

He stopped wanting the sensation to go away.

At least until Chloe started screaming.

Felix felt Alec jerk away. He withdrew his hand, though his entire body ached from the lack of resolution. But, because Chloe might be hurt, he forced himself to roll away and turn his attention to the human.

After listening for a couple of seconds, Felix relaxed back. "She's having a nightmare."

Alec coiled forward to peer at her. "Are you sure?" His voice was pierced with anxiety. Because god forbid anyone ever witness the prude in a relaxed state.

"No, she's screaming her dead boyfriend's name because she saw your erection," Felix said drily. "Seriously, get over yourself."

He heaved himself to a stand and went over to wake Chloe.

Felix spent the rest of the night next to Chloe as she drifted in and out of her uneasy sleep. He and Alec did not speak until dawn.

"Did I keep you awake?" she asked Felix and Felix honestly answered no. She apologized anyway as she handed back the coat. "You must have been freezing."

"I never get cold," he replied, knowing Chloe would only take it as macho bravado. Feigning enthusiasm, he asked "What's for breakfast?"

It was that awful dry bread and cheese again, though Chloe had not complained about it, so maybe it tasted fine to humans. Felix felt the urge to spread his suffering. "I'll get Alec."

Chloe looked over. Alec was sprawled on his side, his eyes shut tight. "No, let him sleep."

"He's faking." Faking like a big faker. Felix bounced up and kicked him, his booted toe cracking against Alec's ribcage. "Come on, it's time to get up."

Chloe winced; maybe he kicked too hard for a human. Alec did not move. Felix sighed; of course Alec would do this. Play dead and hope all his problems went away.

Felix hooked his foot under Alec's torso and kicked up. Alec tossed a couple of inches and crashed to his other side. He could not pretend to sleep through that.

He did not bother pretending surprise or disorientation. He just picked himself up and brushed off the damp dirt from his clothes as best he could.

"Are you okay?" Chloe asked.

"Yes."

She tore off a chunk of bread and handed the remaining loaf out. Felix picked up his portion, while watching and listening for his real meal.

He noticed the forest's eerie silence. Ordinarily he would hear songbirds and raptors overhead and the rustle of small critters to greet the day. There was very little activity. Either the wildlife was frightened off by the dying humans - which never happened, not with all of them - or the virus transmitted to them.

Felix's heart sank. They might have survived the virus, but what good would it do if it killed off all their food?

"What's wrong?" Chloe asked.

"Have you seen any birds or rodents around the past few days?" Felix posed.

Chloe's eyes widened. "No," she answered, hushed. "There was some roadkill, but I thought those animals were run over."

"They probably were," Felix supposed, not wanting to give into alarm. "Maybe it's just me, but the woods sound quieter."

He glanced at Alec. If he was wrong, Alec would snipe back to correct him.

"There are fish in the river," Alec said. "Nothing else."

Fish would not do them much good. The further evolved from humans, the less sustaining the blood. Cold-blooded animals would be virtually useless in sating their thirst.

Chloe pondered her own concerns about the fish. "I hope they're safe enough."

After they "ate", Chloe collected the remaining food and stowed it in her backpack.

Felix suggested they travel closer to the road. With the wildlife absent from the area, he was anxious to find other humans - other food. They walked for most of the morning, and, though they found several more decaying corpses, there were no live humans.

"It seems the virus has run its course in this area," Chloe said. "I wonder why we didn't get it."

Felix wondered that, too. "Maybe we were just lucky."

"I find that hard to believe," she replied. "I was with Vincent all that time . . ."

She trailed off. Felix found himself agreeing with her. Alec had been exposed to Gianna's blood, and Chloe had been exposed to Vincent's. Yet neither of them had gotten sick. There was something stronger than luck at play.

Alec gasped. Felix automatically yanked Chloe back, just in case Alec started spewing blood. He lunged in front of the other vampire, and peered into his irises. Not even a dot of yellow.

"What happened?" Chloe asked, craning her neck towards them, but not daring to step closer.

Felix glanced down at the ground. A rat poked its head out from behind the tire of the car up ahead.

"It's nothing," Felix explained. Chloe frowned in doubt. "Just a rat."

Chloe moved her head back and forth around them. "I don't see it."

"By the car," Alec stammered.

Squinting in that direction, Chloe commented, "That's miles away. You don't think rats could be a vector . . ."

"It's possible," Felix answered. "But he's just freaked because it's a rat."

"Let's turn back," Alec suggested, perhaps pleaded.

Chloe froze. "Turn back?" she echoed, in the same scared stiff tone as Alec. Felix deduced from that tone that she would rather endure the axe than go back to where Vincent's body lay.

Which would win out, Alec's irrational phobia of rats, or Chloe's desire not to see her boyfriend's disease ridden corpse? Right now, Felix had more sympathy for Chloe's position.

"We're not turning around because of some bloody tiny rat," he roared. In a gentler voice, he said, "Come on. We'll go past very quick. It's not going to hurt you."

"Rats aren't so bad," Chloe chattered, as they walked towards the edge of the road, dragging Alec along with them. "I had one as a pet when I was a kid. They're very affectionate, you know. More than hamsters."

Her litany of facts did not do much good. Alec's fingers dug into Felix's arm. Felix maneuvered carefully by the car so that he could shield the other vampire from any sudden superattack. The rat hardly paid them any attention: it was too busy scouting for crumbs in the pavement. Nevertheless, it was not until the evening - when the car was miles out of sight, when Alec finally released his life grip from Felix. Then he mounted a good distance from them so he could sulk by himself


	7. Chapter 7

Chloe would not go to sleep. "I know I should but I don't want to have that dream again."

"About Vincent?" Felix guessed.

She nodded. "I see him coming after me, bleeding. He wants to smear his blood all over me so that I get infected." She sucked in a breath before adding, "Not that he would do that. I guess it's survivor's guilt or something."

"Dreams are weird that way," Felix said, though he did not really remember. He wished he did. His life he remembered in stark detail, but his dreams had blurred. He missed the vividity that his otherwise flawless memory could not seem to capture.

Chloe, fooled into believing Alec was asleep, asked, "What's the deal with him and rats?"

Felix shrugged. "No real reason. Just a weird phobia."

"It's not weird," Alec spoke up in defense. Chloe yipped, startled. "Rats are very harmful. They eat humans."

Felix burst out laughing. That, naturally, earned him a good numbing shock.

He missed whatever statement Chloe gave, but when he revived Alec was talking again.

"There used to be this punishment in the Middle Ages where they would put rats on the chest of the prisoner and set a cage over them. Then they would lay fiery coals over the cage. The rats would try to get away from the coals by chewing through the prisoner's body."

Felix's throat thickened at hearing that revelation. He was sure it was not some esoteric argument that was pulled up in the heat of the debate. It had more significance than that.

He knew, via Aro and the rest of the Volturi, that the Witch Twins' lives had not been full of pleasures as his own had been. He knew that Aro had rescued them after their town had almost burned them as witches. Now it seemed that their near demise at the hands of the ignorant townsfolk had only been the surface of the tortures they endured. Is it any wonder that they were so dour and untrusting? Felix thought with gravity.

"Did that really happen?" he asked Alec.

They glanced over, as if they had forgotten his presence.

"I didn't make it up," Alec answered steadily. His dark eyes warned against Felix inquiring further about it.

He had never meant for Felix to hear that.

To Chloe, well . . . he allowed that. She was an ignorant human; she would have no real understanding of it. And she was too insistent on defending her precious rats to connect his fact of a long ago injustice with her present day companions.

It would, he had vowed, the only time he would ever mention that terrible time. He had never talked about it with anyone, even Jane. Aro knew, of course, but there was no advantage for him to share his knowledge of it. Alec made sure of that by scrupulously attending to his duties.

Now Felix had heard some of the story, and he had no one to blame but himself. He was the one who cast the numbing spell that knocked Felix out; he should have made sure he stayed out.

Chloe's fatigue overcame her late in the night and she fell asleep. Her warm breaths blasted on Alec's skin, the rhythm calm and uninterrupted.

Felix was looking at him differently than usual. Before he treated Alec like a puzzle to tool around with in his spare time. He could not comprehend how anyone could live such a serious and (according to Felix) joyless life. Now part of the puzzle had been solved and it was not much fun anymore.

Finally Alec paced to him. "Give me the phone," he demanded. He was not asking permission.

"Huh?" Felix grunted. "What for?"

"Not your business." Though it was apparent he was going to call Jane. Who else was there?

Felix reached into his pocket and tossed the phone to Alec. Alec immediately whisked away, gaining as much distance from them as possible while he dialed.

Jane's spritelike voice answered. "Hey."

"It's me."

"I know," she said, grinning. He could almost hear her lips twitch upwards.

"Are you safe?"

"From everything except dying from boredom," she sighed. "They won't let anyone leave the city. You?"

"Safe enough," Alec averred. Strange that he felt like he was lying, when in the strictest sense he wasn't. "We hadn't encountered anyone since yesterday."

"What about food?" Jane asked, her voice raising, picking up on his unease.

Alec struggled to remain nonchalant. If she did not know about the wildlife dying off, he was not going to bring it up. "We have a back up meal," he told her. "That is, if Felix doesn't get too attached."

"Let me guess. A young fuckable woman."

Shock delayed his answer. She guessed the truth too accurately. Alec wondered what else she gleaned from him.

"Right."

"Typical."

Demitri murmured in the background, pleading for Jane to get back into bed. Alec's ears steamed at the words he overheard.

"Jane, were you . . ."

"Was I what, Brother?" she asked in her innocent tone.

"Were you . . . with Demitri when I called?" Alec finished.

Jane laughed giddily. "Yeah. That's the only part of this situation that's not boring."

He had never heard his sister like this before. Of course he knew she and Demitri were doing it; there were no surprises on that account. He was not that naive.

After seven hundred years, she was happy. He would never begrudge her that. But Jane's new behavior somehow disturbed him in a way he could not articulate.

"I didn't call about anything important," he apologized, suddenly aware that he was intruding. "We can talk later."

"Are you sure?" Jane kept her voice level, though Alec was sure she could not wait to get back to Demitri. "When I picked up the phone, I was sure something was wrong."

"There isn't," Alec quickly replied. "Nothing beyond the usual."

"Is Felix being an ass?" Jane tried to determine. "If he is, I can pain him."

"It's not him. I meant the disease and the Volturi being gone and everything."

She sighed more heavily. Great, he depressed her. Demitri would probably rip his innards out for that.

"I miss them too," she confessed. "None of it seems real. But things will get better once the disease goes away and the four of us can be together again."

She laughed again as Demitri tickled her.

"I've got to hang up," Alec fibbed. "I'll see you soon."

"Of course," Jane said. She sounded so sure. "I love you."

"I love you too."

Jane laughed as she clicked off.

Alec turned off the phone. He stared off in the unfamiliar valley ahead, trying not to think about how easily Jane moved on without him.


	8. Chapter 8

Hours passed by, and Alec had yet to return.

Felix had lent his coat to Chloe again, but the girl was shivering violently. Her skin had paled, glowing eerily in the predawn light. A frost dwelled in the air, dabbing the tips of the pine needles in watery fuzz. Felix gazed at the frozen branches. Then he glanced back at Chloe.

He shifted over to her. Her heartbeat slowed in sleep, and then further, descending steadily in pace and in power. A blue tinge appeared on her lips.

He pushed himself up.

"Fuck."

He should have realized that the weather was cold and wet. Too cold and wet for humans to stay comfortably outside.

"Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck."

He took off in the direction he saw Alec leave. He ran farther than he expected to. For a second, he thought Alec might have ditched them altogether, as he had threatened to do. But in the next second, he came upon a valley. Alec sat against a fallen tree, his hand still curled around the phone, but he was not talking into it.

Felix halted in front of him.

"I need your coat."

Alec turned his head slightly, his blank expression not changing.

"Look," Felix explained. "Chloe is hypothermic and I need your coat."

Alec climbed up from the fallen tree. He took off his coat and flung it at Felix's face. Felix snatched it and dashed back to the clearing where Chloe still slumbered.

"Why didn't you build a fire?" Alec asked, following right behind him.

Felix wrapped Alec's coat around Chloe and tucked her bare hands into the sleeves. He rubbed her shoulders in a meager way to warm her up.

"Why didn't you?" he snapped back.

"You're the one who wanted to bring her along. She' s your responsibility."

Felix gritted his teeth. "Everything's too damp for a fire anyway," he pointed out. "Unless you have a Harry Potter novel tucked away in a pocket somewhere."

That usually provoked Alec into a rage. He read worthy literature in over forty languages, he had often said in a derisive manner. He did not read Harry Potter.

This time, instead of flying into a rage, Alec merely narrowed his eyes before stating, "There's an empty house ten miles east of here."

"Why didn't you say that sooner?" Felix lifted Chloe, easily supporting her in his strong arms.

"I'm saying it now." Evasive as usual.

Felix decided to let that go. "Are you sure it's empty?" he asked, hoping futilely that they would find some uninfected human snacks in there.

"I didn't smell anyone."

It was better than nothing. If they got inside, at least Chloe would not die.

Chloe slept (or remained unconscious) through the route to the house. Alec kicked in the door and Felix stepped in after him, moving carefully as to not jostle the human.

The house had been abandoned long ago, judging by the wool-thick dust that gathered inside. The thick walls blocked out the worst of the elements. The house was dark, with only two narrow windows letting in light, and the only furniture inside - besides the iron stove - was a long butcher block table. Felix laid Chloe on the table, after sweeping aside some of the dust, then searched in vain for a blanket or a tablecloth that might be lying around somewhere.

The place was not nearly as homey as Sabina's cabin. Nevertheless, a feeling of deja vu swept up in Felix. To distract himself from it, he continued massaging Chloe's back. That was what one was supposed to do with a hypothermia patient. Only he had no body heat to share, so he had to manufacture it with friction.

Felix listened to Alec busy around the house. Alec explored the other two rooms, which did not take long as there was little else to see. He tore out some of the floorboards from one of the other rooms and piled them into the stove to heat the house. Then he searched through Chloe's backpack.

"She's out of food," he reported.

That was another problem Felix had not anticipated. By Lucifer, when he insisted on bringing Chloe with them, he never thought about the long term complications. After all, Chloe was an adult and could care for herself. But she never complained about the cold and when she generously shared the food that she needed with them, neither vampire gave any thought to the limited supply.

What else could the human eat around here? Felix's mind raced back to human days, when he could identify the edible plants. But his memory of his human days, like his past dreams, blurred out the details. Besides, what knowledge was left was specific to another land and time.

"I suppose there's the fish," Felix said, doubt lacing his suggestion. The virus could have spread to the fish since the day before, and if it hadn't, they had no idea how to prepare the fish to remove the other diseases humans could contract. Undercooked meat was dangerous to them; surely that applied to fish as well. At least with his vampire reflexes, fish would be easy to catch.

Alec sniffed, mildly expressing distaste at the effort to catch a useless animal. For vampires, trying to get a meal from fish was as good as drawing it from the air. Felix's fists tightened. He was sure Alec had reached the end of his patience with the human - the "Food" - and would demand they put her out of her misery.

Felix did not want to give her up.

Luckily for him, Alec's pragmatic side won over. While Chloe's situation appeared desperate, theirs wasn't, and the point of a back up meal was to use her when they needed it. "I'll get some," he volunteered unenthusiastically and left.

He returned soaking wet, with a big load of fish gathered in his outer shirt. He dumped them in front of the oven. Some of them were still alive, flopping and quivering from their removal from the water that sustained them. Their scent was normal, fortunately, and free of the virus.

Felix eyed Alec, drinking in the appealing body he had never really glimpsed before. Alec's thin T shirt clung to his subtly formed chest. The muscles were not as clearly defined as his own or Demitri's; nobody would take Alec for a bodybuilder. But neither was there the childlike softness Felix would have guessed he would find. Alec's muscles were firm and strong.

If Alec noticed Felix's leers, he ignored them as he cooked them fish. Apparently he remembered more than Felix had about making them fit for human consumption. Felix tried to pay attention to Alec's preparations, but his eyes kept drifting back to the other vampire's taut body.

Felix could no longer resist. He abandoned his vigil over Chloe. Though his fingers ached toward exploring lower, he withheld that much. It was too risky. Instead, he reached out to Alec and brushed back a soggy clump of hair that hung down on his forehead.

So focused on his task, Alec jolted. Felix withdrew his arm a few inches back. A twinge of fear overtook him. He prepared for the inevitable numbing attack.

Alec's expressionless gaze met Felix's ridiculously vulnerable one. No attack was delivered. Nevertheless, Felix knew not to press that one (successful) moment.

He gestured to the fish. "Can I help?"

"Sure." For the next couple of hours, no word was exchanged except for instructions on how to prepare the fish.

After all the fish were roasted with a charred black crust, and Alec put on his dried shirt, Felix became aware of the disturbing silence again.

He grasped around for something - anything - to say, before Alec noticed the odd silence.

"How are Jane and Demitri?"

Alec faced away from him "They're fine."


	9. Chapter 9

In her dream, Chloe was talking to Melina, who told her about the "snake people" that lived in the mountains near Volterra. People vanished in Volterra; according to Melina, the Snake People took them. "Foreigners, usually," Mellna informed her nonchalantly. "They go to Volterra and are never seen again."

She and Vincent and Melina and Tonio wandered in the countryside. Vincent collapsed, and Chloe and the others carried him in search of a hospital. Soon the ground was smothered with dead snakes. The same virus that had taken Vincent had afflicted them.

Mellina and Tonio were snatched away. Chloe dropped Vincent and waded away until she ran into Felix and Alec. Felix wrapped a scaly hand around her.

"We'll save her for later," he said to Alec, a forked tongue flickering out of his mouth, his red eyes lit with malice.

Chloe opened her eyes. The smoke from the stove stung her eyes and the rank smell of fish assaulted her.

She pushed herself up by her elbows to a sitting position.

"Fish?" Felix asked, proudly holding a charred fish body up to her face. His red eyes flickered disconcertingly in the dimly lit room.

Chloe squinted past him. Piled on the floor was a great mound of cooked fish. Way too much fish for the three of them.

"Uh-" she grunted, feeling a little nauseated from the overwhelming stink.

"That's all the food you have," Alec accused, brooding from a corner behind the stove.

Chloe's head pounded. She tried to climb down from the table, but her legs dragged sluggishly under her and refused to support her when she tried to place her feet on the floor and stand. She settled for sitting at the edge of the table.

"Whose house is this?" she asked.

"No one's," Felix answered, sounding briskly cheerful. "There are houses like this all over Italy. The families emigrated decades ago and never came back." He plopped the charred fish beside her, along with her refilled thermos.

The echo of her dream - "_they are never seen again_"- made her shiver. These two guys she accompanied -that she begged to accompany - could be anybody. She had not cared the other day. Vincent was gone and she was alone and the prospect of being alone scared her more than imminent death. They could have been the incarnation of Jack the Ripper and she would have gone with them. Now she wondered if, in her desperation, she made an unwise decision.

She took the fish and bit off a small bite. Felix had cooked the fish for far too long; it was dry and chalky and hard to chew, but she smiled anyway, hoping to appeal to his goodwill.

"Are you going to have any?" she asked. She sounded a bit frantic.

"We already ate while you were sleeping," Alec cut in shortly. "We should save the rest."

Chloe's wide eyes roved to the pile. "There's plenty. Unless there's a refrigerator or something, the fish won't last that long anyway, so we might as well splurge."

The guys stared back at her as if that never occurred to them. Finally Felix's face relaxed into a sheepish smile.

"I guess you can tell we don't do much fishing," he said, before he knealt down and claimed a few fish. Chloe waited for him to bite in before she resumed her meal.

"Me neither," Chloe said. "I've lived in New York City my whole life before this trip."

"New York?" he echoed between bites. He seemed as put off by the taste of the fish as he was, and did a poor job of disguising it.

"Yup. Not Manhattan, though. My family's from Queens. I went to college at Columbia - that's where I met Vincent - and I've applied to medical schools around the area. Vincent suggested that we do a little traveling before I start."

"You picked a hell of a time to travel," Felix observed.

Chloe's smile fell. "Yeah." That reminder of Vincent's death caused a piercing pain in her heart. She distracted herself from her grief by reminding herself of her task: to learn more about her traveling companions. "What about you? Where are you from? You're not Italians, are you?"

Felix glanced toward Alec. Alec glared at her, but remained in his sulky I'm- not-taking-part-in-this stance. Felix shook off that brief hesitation and answered.

"I'm from Scotland, he's from England."

"Oh," Chloe was both pleased and surprised. "You don't have the accents."

"We travel a lot." Felix grew more uneasy as he explained. "Our family - our parents - were diplomats of sorts."

"Oh," she said again, this time more subdued. Felix's use of the word "were" stood out starkly. Perhaps the only reason for their reticence about their background was their family's and fellow villagers' deaths from the virus. Hadn't Felix told her there was nothing left in Volterra?

She wondered about her own family. Her parents, her brother and his wife and kids. The last time she checked the news, the United States seemed relatively safe from the plague, but that could have changed in the past day or two. A thought surfaced that they must be terribly worried that they had not heard from her. In the fog of the chaos from the virus and from Vincent's death, she forgot to call them.

"I should call my family," she said aloud, lunging off the table. Her legs felt steadier, but in her rush, she tripped and would have smashed her face to the floor if Felix had not caught her.

He propped her back against the table, allowing her to regain her balance, then whipped around. "Alec."

"What?" Alec's tone implied he was not welcoming his inclusion to their acquainting session.

"Last I checked, you had the phone."

Alec shifted his arm, retrieving his phone from his pocket and tossed it towards Felix. Felix intercepted it and placed it in Chloe's hand.

"Do you want me to go out with you?" he asked, his red eyes meeting hers.

"Is it necessary?" Chloe asked. She would rather go out alone, but they knew the area better than her. The other side of her two-pronged question asked if she was allowed to leave if she chose to do so: if she was a companion or a prisoner.

Felix glanced towards Alec for confirmation, and, receiving none, decided for himself. "No. Just stay by the house. If there's any trouble, scream and we'll hear."

"Okay." All seemed reasonable enough. "Thanks, Felix."

A hazy sunset shone through the cool mist. Chloe breathed in, forcing her lungs to expand as much as they could. It was such a relief to breathe fully.

A chill that resided deep within her returned. However stifling the house was, at least it was warm. Chloe would not stay out here much longer. She would allow just enough time to breathe and make her calls, then go back inside.

She dialed her parents, then her brother. Neither answered the phone so she left messsages on their voicemail. She told them she was fine and she had not gotten the virus, but she could not say much more than that. She said nothing about the inhuman strangers she was with. Tears streamed down her cheeks when she related Vincent's death, but she managed to summon a stoic, practical tone when she told them the quarantine order would not allow her to return home for some time.

The guys left the door open while she was outside. Chloe was glad: the house had a chance to air out its fish odor. She hoped, in her rational or irrational sense, that they overheard some of her phone conversation. Then they would know she had people who cared about her and waited for her return home. If they had any plans to harm her in the future, they would have to take that into account, right? From what Chloe gleaned from them, they were not unfeeling, remorseless creatures. Felix seemed to care about her well-being. However, she knew that if their survival came down to it, they would kill her.

Chloe could not strike out on her own. As a bona fide city girl, she utterly lacked the outdoor skills she needed to eke out an existence, even in the time to trek to the nearest town or civilian camp. She needed those strangers, who, despite their admitted ineptitude of fishing and like skills, seemed to possess a knowledge of the mountains.

She flicked the phone to the news sites, searching for the latest news. The American stations reported sporadic outbreaks in many of the cities, but declared to have it under control. That did little to reassure Chloe of her family's safety. Europe was suffering from great casualties, particularly along the Mediterranean nations. Like with New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, pundits were stating that Italy, which lost the greatest number of people, would never be the same.

Chloe powered off the phone and ducked back inside.

She blinked, adjusting to the darkness. The fire in the stove had dwindled to embers.

Felix zipped over to her, moving with a grace Chloe's eyes had trouble processing. He took her hand and escorted her to the table.

"Here's your phone back," she offered, placing the phone back in Felix's large palm.

"All right." Felix held up the phone over Chloe's head, wordlessly asking Alec if he wanted it. It was too dark for Chloe to discern his facial expression, but she was able to see his shadowed head shake back and forth. Sighing, Felix slipped the phone into his own pocket.

"Do you need help to get more firewood?" Chloe asked.

"Is it that cold out?" Felix asked matter-of-factly.

"It's supposed to drop to the low forties," Chloe answered, then struggled with a metric translation. "I mean . . ."

"No, I'll get it." Whether Felix was referring to the firewood or to his understanding of the Fahrenheit scale, Chloe could not tell. Perhaps both. "Where are you going?" he snapped.

Chloe whirled around. Alec had finally left his corner and soundlessly swung the door open.

Alec's tone was just as sharp. "Out." He let the door whump shut behind him.

Felix's jaw jutted out in the protest he could not finish. He rubbed his forehead with the heel of his hand, then quickly recomposed himself.

"So, firewood," he said, his metamorphasis into the congenial host in place. "Right this way."


	10. Chapter 10

It was getting harder to be around them. They were so goddamn jovial together, indulging each other with questions and efforts of getting to know each other. The timing was just too perfect. Felix found his soul mate and Aro was not around to object.

Didn't anyone care that there was a virus wiping out everything on Earth?

Alec listened as he ventured into the thick forest. He listened for anything that was still alive that could provide a meal. He no longer particularly cared if they were human. He was too thirsty to fuss over the taste of the lesser animals. He found two deer: both dead and staring out with yellow ringed eyes. Gnats buzzed around the carcasses. The gnats did not live long enough naturally for the virus to affect them, though if they feasted on the deers' blood, the tiny traces of blood within them might not be safe to eat. They would not do much good anyway: one would need to eat an exponential number of gnats to get any substantive meal.

Alec circled for hours. The only animals in his path were dead. Almost all of them. Alec heard a chilling skitter of tiny feet, and immediately recognized the source. Rats. He doubled back before they could emerge. A crawling sensation zigzagged his stomach.

He breathed heavily, trying to banish the memory of those clawed feet scurrying over him. After he calmed several minutes later, he took slight comfort that those rats were at least miles away from where he and Felix and the human took shelter.

Defeated, he travelled back to the house. He had hoped to bring something to eat, something to justify his time out on his own but realistically did not expect to find any. The fish still swam; that was good news for the human. She and Felix could be jovial about that, too.

The fish smell assailed him once he entered the valley. The leftover fish had been strung around the house. Surprising that Felix could find the time to do that while befriending the Food. He strained to hear what was going on inside. Chloe was sleeping, so he could go in without fear that he was interrupting something.

Felix turned from his attention to the fire, which he was watching much like one would watch at television programme. "Had a good walk?" he asked snidely.

Alec ignored that. "What's with the fish?" he replied.

"Chloe was complaining that the smell was suffocating her. And I figured, maybe it would attract some of the animals here."

"No it won't." More defeated than criticizing. Felix took offense anyway.

"Well I don't see you coming up with any better ideas, do I?" Felix shot to a stand and paced towards the table. "All you do is sulk and complain. Why don't you do something useful for once?"

The accusation stung Alec. Felix was wrong in implying that he had not pulled his weight here. Who found the shelter while Felix was wringing his hands over the human's hypothermia? Who got all those fish to feed the human?

A tremble overtook Felix's hands. He leaned against the wall he swiped his palm against his forehead.

"Felix," Alec said, shifting forward. Alert to the trembling that no vampire was supposed to have.

"Are you doing this?" Felix mumbled, before he dropped. The house shook as his back slammed against the wall.


	11. Chapter 11

Alec sprang to him. "Felix?" He shook the bigger vampire. He did not have much experience in waking others.

"What's going on?" Chloe asked drowsily.

"Stay there," Alec ordered. _This is a joke, this has to be a joke. Please be a joke._

He folded back Felix's eyelid. Despite his desperate plea to find otherwise, a thin yellow ring rimmed Felix's eyes.

Chloe, disobeying his orders, knealt behind him and grasped Felix's wrist. At once he noticed there was no rash forming, but that did not calm him at all. He resented Chloe for dragging him back to what had to be a cruel joke. Any minute, Felix would bounce back up, laughing at his gullibility. That was how things were supposed to be, and fate had no right to flip that around and take Felix away.

"He doesn't have a pulse." Absent of shock or sorrow, Chloe carefully worded that observation. Alec realized she had suspected about them for quite some time. If she revealed this even five minutes ago, Alec would have been furious. He would have clung to Aro's teachings that the safety of their kind depended almost entirely on their ability to keep their true selves hidden. Another time, it would have mattered, but the rules had changed.

When Alec did not try to answer, she asked directly, "You're not human, are you? I can't help him if you don't tell me."

He had nothing left in him to deny it.

"We're vampires," he said hollowly, not caring how she took it.

"So he needs human blood?" Chloe asked, without hesitating or breaking apart. Her training as a doctor must have kicked in. The reminder that Chloe was a doctor lifted his hopes slightly.

"Yes."

Chloe lunged to her feet and swooped up her backpack. She took out a knife and sliced open her arm under her elbow.

He should talk her out of this, Alec recognized. A human giving her life for a vampire was madness. It went against all logic. Felix was already dead. Chloe should not give her life for a dead man. Yet he knew he was not going to stop her. If there was a chance that Felix would recover . . .

"He can't drink from you directly," Alec instructed. "If the venom enters your body you'll turn into a vampire." _And then what use will you be?_ was his silent implication.

"I'll get a cup." Chloe unscrewed the lid to her thermos. She retrieved a syringe and squeezed out a suitable amount of blood.

"That's enough." Alec finally stepped in when she was in danger of losing too much blood.

Alec took the lid and poured the blood into Felix's mouth, relieved when Felix swallowed it without resisting.

He lifted Felix to the table, swiping away the unneeded coats that Chloe nested on top. Chloe weakly offered to help, thinking that Felix's giant stature might be too much for the smaller vampire, but Alec dismissed it ("I've got him."). He picked Felix up almost effortlessly and laid him gently on the table. Reluctant to let go, he brushed his hand against Felix's forehead. There was no fever, no other sign that he was sick except the yellow rings on the eyes.

In a slight attempt to ease the strain of hurt he sensed in Chloe (her feelings showed too transparently for his comfort), he gathered the coats and brought them to her. "We don't need these so you may as well use them," he said gruffly. She replied a polite thank you, not nearly as heartfelt as it was to Felix earlier in the day.

A strange pain rutted through Felix's body. Not sharp like the pain he felt when Jane administered her vengeance on him, but slow and sluggish.

He tried to sit up and acquaint himself with his surroundings. He recognized immediately that he was not in his chamber in the Volterra palace. The lapse of memory was just as alien to him as the pain and nausea. A blurry light from a fire on the stove illuminated the room.

He tried to sit up. Lifting his throbbing head from the table's surface actually caused him to groan out loud. The ground beneath him rolled.

"Felix?"

That was Alec's voice; at least Felix's memory had not deserted him completely. He tilted his head towards the direction of the voice. Alec stood, his legs appearing to bend like rubber in the dim light.

"I feel like shite," Felix protested. His Scottish brogue came in thickly.

"Do you remember what happened?" Now Alec was next to him.

He did. The blankness in his mind ebbed away. "You didn't do this," he said, resuming the line of query he had pursued before he collapsed.

"I don't think so," Alec answered. Deadly serious and contrite as usual.

"Don't get your knickers all twisted, I wasn't . . ." Felix's stomach roiled. "I have to hurl."

Alec moved him quickly outside. The undigested remains of the fish and maybe some of that bread and cheese erupted out of him. The exertion from the heaving weakened Felix so that if Alec had not been holding him up, he would have fallen into his mess.

When Felix finished retching, Alec helped Felix slither back to the ground. Alec's hand rubbed him gently on Felix's forearm, a sensation that Felix found soothing.

"I shouldn't have had that fish," he joked, knowing fully well that the fish had not caused this disease. He waited for Alec to argue just that, but Alec withheld his compulsion to correct for once.

Felix noticed the rain slashing against them. That, too, was soothing. The rain pelted sonorously against the roof. It reminded him that they were not alone.

"Is Chloe okay?" he asked. He tried to sit up again. Big mistake. The ground rolled again. He dropped back against the damp earth.

"She's fine," Alec replied. "Let me know when you want to go back in."

"You're not taking off again, are you?" Felix mumbled. Even talking was tiresome. But it was urgent that Alec stayed with him.

"Not tonight." Alec's voice was softer than usual. "Tomorrow I'm going to get more food for Chloe."

"And you'll come back?"

A hesitation. "Yes."

"Good," he declared weakly.

They were still outside when Chloe woke up and came looking for them.

"I was worried," she said. The rain had let up, but the air was still chilly. She had layered Felix's and Alec's coats over her body, but leaving the fire warmed house caused her to shiver.

"Sorry," Felix said. Alec was not going to bother with apologies. Alec climbed to his feet, and Felix made an effort to, but his legs lost their strength. Alec turned and helped him up.

Chloe disappeared back into the cabin. Alec brought Felix back to the table.

"Are you comfortable?"

Felix grunted "sure." A lie, but there was nothing anyone could do to improve his situation at the moment.

"I'm going to look for food," Alec instructed to Chloe. "Don't feed him until I get back."

"Maybe I should come with you," Chloe volunteered.

"No." The last thing he wanted was her traipsing after her and slowing him down. All he said, though, was "I'd rather he not be alone."

She nodded solemnly.

His impetus for searching for human food renewed by the fact that Felix needed her blood, Alec went back to the roads. He smashed through the car windows (when this was all over, the survivors would think it was human looters) and took any food he found that had not rotted. He would get some fish as well, but humans needed more variety in their diet.

When he returned, Chloe commented on the sugary snacks that were included in the supplies. "Those would last the longest." Alec had also salvaged a little fruit and bread; unfortunately all the meat had rotted.

She went outside to get some rainwater that she let collect in her thermos. Alec looked away as she drank, trying not to think of his own thirst. Truthfully, he could live several weeks without blood. The available blood must go to Felix.

He glanced over at Felix's prone form. The larger vampire had fallen back into unconsciousness. He lay absolutely still, which appeared more disturbing than it actually was. Alec wondered if he was able to dream.

She stepped back in, taking an apple and biting into it. "I've been trying to make comparisons of how this disease works. It travels through the blood, but while it enters through the humans' bloodstream, it enters vampires differentlly - through the digestive tract. So this will cause some differences in how it affects its hosts. The prospects of survival is actually more hopeful for you. Theoretically, if we keep Felix full of healthy blood, we can stave off death indefinitely."

"Theoretically?" he echoed.

"Well, I haven't exactly tested this theory," Chloe explained pointedly. "And it's not a cure. It's just holding off . . . the worst of it."

That did not sound much better. This remedy merely delayed Felix's inevitable death. Was it even right to do it, to make Felix suffer through all the symptoms just to say he had not died yet?

Chloe continued on. "Also, vampires don't sweat."

"I know that," Alec grumbled. He had known that for over seven hundred years. Chloe did not need to pretend it was some grand discovery.

"It was why you could not smell the virus on Felix, when you could smell it on Vincent." Chloe's voice wavered when she uttered Vincent's name. "The smell was emitted through Vincent's pores. But as vampires don't have that mechanism, no odor." She paused, strategizing. "How often do you eat during the best of times?"

"Once a day is fine. We can go much longer without. When we're healthy," Alec amended. He had no idea of how that arrangement must be altered in a case like this.

"Once a day then," Chloe decided, assuming the authority of a doctor. "What about you?"

"What about me?"

"What are you going to eat?"

Not your business, Alec was tempted to say. Except it was her business, if she was the only bloodbag around.

"When it gets to that point, I'll let you know," he promised.

Her face transformed into a mixture of worry and fear. Alec was glad Felix was not awake because he would try to cheer up the human.

Chloe needed to be worried.


	12. Chapter 12

The night was consumed in silence. Chloe twitched and whimpered in her sleep. Felix did not move at all.

Alec kept an expectant eye on his fellow guard. If he did not know better, he could have sworn that Felix had timed his illness on purpose, just to be irritating. Felix specialized in irritating; he would know when to stir his victims up and when to leave them begging . . .

He was going mad. He had to quit his paranoid delusions and accept the reality that while Felix was still minimally alive, he might not ever be the same again. The Felix that delighted in bad jokes, particularly bad jokes played on Alec, might be gone for good.

Once that thought latched on him, it refused to go away. The revelation made impossible other things that had to happen in the future. He was no longer sure that he would see Jane again, or that the virus would stop before it wiped out every human on the planet, or that he would ever leave this claustrophobic valley. He was foolish in pretending that everything would revert to normal once the virus passed. Without the Volturi, and without Felix, he had no future. He doubted anyone on Earth did.

He did not notice the pale light that announced the sunrise, not until Chloe awakened. She brushed her hair out of her face.

"Did Felix wake up at all?" she asked.

"No." Alec's voice was quiet, exhausted from the bombardment of ugly truths and doubts. "Is that bad?"

"I don't know," Chloe said honestly. She scooted her legs around from her makeshift bed of coats and stood. She strode over to the table to check on her patient. She parted open Felix's eye. "Still plenty of red," she noted with some satisfaction. So far, her theory proved right.

Hours later, Chloe asked Alec, "So how long have you been a vampire?"

The entire day, the two had not exchanged any words that were not related to their direct survival. Chloe tired of the ominous silence that had settled over the house. She had fed Felix again and Alec refuelled the stove, so there was nothing else that needed to be done. It suddenly occurred to her how long the day would stretch in this silence.

Alec moved his head to stare at her. Disapproving.

"Look," Chloe said, "I don't know about you, but I don't want to sit here staring at each other like in _The Thing."_

"I don't have a problem with it."

"You can even have the first question."

"There's nothing I need to know about you." _You're Food_, he silently added, though he was sure he got the idea across to her.

Chloe's face narrowed in exasperation. It reminded Alec of the look Jane got when she demanded he do something she wanted.

"What made you decide to become a doctor?" he asked.

A ridiculous grin spread over her face. "That is a very good question," she chirped. "I never knew anyone who was seriously sick and no one in my family was a doctor. Those are the usual reasons, but not for me. Actually, my role model in that regard was Dana Scully. Have you seen _The X-Files_?"

"Some." Jane was obsessed with that show for about a year.

"What about _ER_?"

That he had not seen. He shook his head.

"Well," Chloe conceded. Her grin melted to a saner level of contemplation. "I wanted to be a person who helped others if something bad happened. Becoming a doctor seemed like the surest way to do that."

As if aware of whom she was talking to, she grinned sheepishly. "I guess it sounds like a silly reason."

"Not really," Alec replied, ignoring the jab that a vampire could not be expected to know about helping others.

He offered nothing else representative of his opinion, so Chloe plied her question. "What was your life like before you became a vampire?"

"You changed your question," he stated.

"Well," Chloe faltered. "That's allowed, isn't it?" Of course it was. She started the game, so she decided the rules.

"Not good."

She did the narrow glare again. "You have to tell me more than that."

Alec cursed her intelligence. "My sister and I were not well liked. One year they found an excuse to get rid of us. They accused us of witchcraft and tried to burn us at the stake. Ar - a vampire found us and rescued us." All of this was common knowledge to the Volturi, so Alec had no difficulty sharing it with this human.

"Oh," was her gutteral reply. Chloe reacted like he had torn open her chest. Her white fingers clutched at the end of the table.

"I'm sorry," she finally said.

"It was done long ago," he said, in some manner of consolation.

Chloe's tone lightened. "So you're sister is a vampire?"

"Obviously."

"Where is she?" she asked, an irritating gentleness or caution absorbed in her voice.

"She and her boyfriend got stranded in Geneva," he explained. "They weren't in Volterra when the virus hit."

"That's good." The odd thing was, Chloe sounded genuinely glad that these two vampires she never met had survived.

It was Alec's turn for a question, and oddly enough, he did have one. "Do you think there is a cure?"

He could see her optimism dim. "The news had not said anything about a cure, but I would think it would be a top priority for everyone," she hedged. "Even so, I don't know if it would help Felix. The doctors would be concentrating on humans."

Alec's hands clenched together. Chloe read his real question too easily.

"There's a vampire who's a doctor. In the United States," he told her. "But I doubt he would want to cure Felix."

"Why not?" She sounded less eager to hear the answer. Like Felix, her curiosity waned when it lead to personal unpleasant knowledge.

"We . . . our coven tried to kill his too many times." Feeling the urge to correct Chloe's judgment, he added, "It wasn't personal. Our coven had to enforce the rules, and his coven broke them. One of the underlings fell in love with a human and told her all about vampires."

"What's wrong with that?" Chloe asked.

"We have to keep our identity hidden. If the wrong person found out, it would ultimately mean the extermination of our kind. Edward was lucky that this human cared about him enough to keep it a secret. She eventually became a vampire herself.

"Aro was lenient with them, but the fact was it wasn't this coven that was the problem. It was the less scrupulous vampires who would see this as preferential treatment and rebel against us, including some from within our ranks. The Cullens got into more trouble, and Aro kept excusing them, using their po- . . . their abilities as a pretext to keep them alive, but they were not grateful for their reprieves. Instead they believed we were persecuting them because they only drank animal blood.

"When word reached us that there was a child vampire with them, we had to act. Creating a child vampire was against the rules; they are too feral and uncontrollable. The one who brought us this news was lying, but we believed it. Why shouldn't we when the Cullens took all those other risks? So our coven gathered up an army and went over there. Had the rumor been true, we would have slaughtered them. But the child was not a full vampire, she was a half breed, created by the underling and his girl when she was still human. We punished the liar, and Aro had some difficulty quelling the fight that some so badly wanted. Of course, the Cullens blamed us. They did not give one thought to their carelessness and how we had to clean up their mess."

Chloe had ceased with the questions, though many parts of Alec's story must have gone over her head. She paused, absorbing this new information. Alec could not begin to guess what she would want to know.

Finally she spoke up. "If this vampire were a true doctor, he would help Felix, no matter what you did to him and his family. It's part of our training. The Hippocratic Oath."

Alec shook his head, unpersuaded. "Humans create these ideals all the time, then put them aside when it suits them. This coven is the same. They would gladly let Felix die."

Chloe tilted her head to the side, studying Alec. "You don't have a lot of trust in others, do you?"

"I trust those who earn my trust," he said shortly.

"Why did you tell me about vampires if it was against the rules?"

Surely she understood that the Volturi would no longer enforce these rules. It did not matter because Alec meant to keep to them. If the virus had demolished the human population as much as he suspected, then he and Felix would need every advantage.

For some odd reason, Alec realized he had stopped equating Chloe with the food supply out there. She had elevated slightly in status. Not as an equal: she would never be that. She had become more like a pet, a therapy animal for Felix. Because of Felix, she had value.

"You deserve to know what's going on," he said.

"Okay," Chloe accepted in hushed voice. "Thank you."

Alec's gaze drifted toward the ceiling. "The sun had set hours ago. You should get some sleep."

Catching herself just before she closed her eyes, Chloe instructed, "Wake me if anything happens with Felix."

Alec did not answer, but she was satisfied he would do as she advised.


	13. Chapter 13

Chloe awakened in a room no different than it had been the past couple of days. She, Alec and Felix were at their customary spots. The fire had died in the stove. She was getting too used to this routine, and the prospect both comforted and terrified her. Comforted because she did not have to face the situation alone, but terrified by the circumstances that had caged them.

She checked on Felix. No change. She could not even discern if the yellow in his eyes grew or receded, but there was enough red in his irises to dispel last resort tactics. Whatever those might be.

She picked up the phone that rested by his side. "I'll be outside," she told Alec. She would come back in a minute later, throttling the receiver. "I can't get the news."

Alec glided over to her.

"Did the battery run down?"

"No." The battery display on the screen measured at half full. "I can't reach my family either." She shoved the phone in his hand. "Call your sister. Maybe the local functions will come through."

He dialed, only to be greeted by an emergency tone.

"The government could be doing this," he reasoned, "as part of their quarantine." The other option did not bear thinking. Because it should not take that many people to maintain cellular signals.

It could mean that everyone on the outside was dead. They had no way of knowing.

After a long lapse of silence, Chloe cautiously proposed leaving.

Cautiously because she understood that Alec regarded her as an inferior in hierarchy, and as inferior creature, she was supposed to receive orders from him, not the other way around. She was sure Felix had a similar view, though Felix exhibited it in a kinder, more humoring attitude. Chloe did not try to fight it; she did not expect to overturn centuries of this built-up perception in the short number of days she had known them.

"I've been thinking," she said, watching Alec's reaction from the corner of her eye. As usual, he waited for her to finish. "We should move on. We'll bring Felix with us," she added, forestalling the predictable first objection Alec might raise.

"We don't know what's going on out there," Alec reminded her.

"Exactly. And we won't know if we stay here. They could have found a cure. They could have let up the quarantine."

"Or they could all be dead," he counterargued. "Or there could be only infected survivors pillaging the cities."

Chloe faced him. "Okay, sure, things could be getting worse. But they could be getting better. Things are not going to get better if we stay here. Felix is not going to get better here. Out there, he has a chance."

A short pause. Alec had to admit she was right. As much as he would like to hide in this remote cabin until the problems brought on by the virus went away, he knew that would not happen.

"When do you want to leave?" he asked,with a trace of reluctance.

"Tomorrow," Chloe decided, forgetting all about the hierarchy.

It had not taken long to pack. The hard part was transporting Felix, or so she thought, but Alec seemed to have no difficulty hefting the larger vampire.

"I could help," she said, expressing her willingness more than her capability. Felix was about a head taller than either of them and, she estimated, a good fifty or sixty pounds heavier.

"You're carrying the bag," he reminded her. "I can manage him."

She led him out the door, stepping out into the warm sunlight. When she turned back, to ensure Alec could lift Felix out by himself, she gasped.

"What?" Alec said, stepping aside in case she left something in the house.

"You're . . . sparkling."

"We do that in the sunlight.," he explained, suddenly self-conscious.

"Should you go back inside?" she asked frantically. "I mean, you're not going to explode or turn into dust, are you?"

"Chloe." She eyed him, still wary. This was the first time she had heard him speak her name. "You watch too much television."

He nodded to the north. "The road is this way."

At noon, Chloe had to stop to rest. "I'm sorry," she said as she sheltered herself under the shade.

"It's okay." Alec lowered Felix to the ground next to her. "I'd rather you reserve your health. I hear this part of the country gets hot during the midday."

"You know where we are?"

"Vaguely. We're a bit north of Rome but closer to the Adriatic side. The river we've been following is the Pescara. I think the closest town is Popoli."

"Oh." Chloe's eyes fluttered. "I've never seen a Mediterranean beach. Vincent and I were going to go . . ."

She let that thought trail off unfinished. She was not a tourist any longer.

"It's all the same ocean," Alec replied, as if consoling her in that she had not missed anything.

Her eyes sprang open. "It is not. You must have traveled enough to have seen the difference between the North Atlantic and the Caribbean."

He squinted at her. "You sound like Felix."

His indecipherable tone lingered with her as Chloe slid into a reclining position and dozed.

It was still hot when she awakened. She brushed off the coats and checked her watch. It was almost time to feed Felix.

She grimaced as she reopened the wound on her arm. She hoped she was not getting blood poisoning. Her knife had not been that sterile to begin with.

Alec saw the blood trickling weakly out of her wound. His eyes darkened.

"I'll get some more fish."

He took off before his thirst overcame him.

Fish was the last thing she wanted to eat, but he was right in that she needed the protein. She felt weak because she had had nothing but sugary snacks the past couple of days.

She filled the thermos lid to the usual amount (god, she had done this often enough to acquire a usual amount) and lifted it to Felix's mouth.

A couple of hours later, Alec brought back four large trout, a much more manageable number now that he no longer had to pretend that three people were eating the catch. Then he reached in his pocket and handed Chloe an orange.

"There's an orange grove several miles east."

"Thank you." The orange did little to whet her appetite, though. She wanted a big steak or a flame grilled hamburger. She wanted a carnivorous feast.

Who knew when she would be able to taste a hamburger again.

Sighing, she dug into the fish Alec cooked for her.


	14. Chapter 14

Felix was surprised to find himself outside. His memory worked a little better this time, though it lagged. Wasn't he supposed to be in some mountain cabin?

"Felix!" Chloe greeted him cheerily, despite the weight of fatigue in her eyes. She knelt next to him.

"What are we doing outside?" he asked. A headache pressed away at his brain. Images mashed together. "Oh, right, the house burned down."

"No, it didn't," Chloe informed him.

"It didn't? Are you sure?"

"I'm sure." She squeezed his upper arm to comfort him. "You must have been dreaming."

"But I don't dream . . ." he started to mutter.

"I know," Chloe related, a beat before he could catch his mistake. "Alec explained it all to me. But these are unusual circumstances."

He echoed Alec's name, then struggled to sit up. The dizziness was there to snare him. Lifting his head took as much effort as it had the other time.

Alec showed up. He had seen Felix struggle to sit up and rushed over. "Hi."

"Hi," Felix returned. His chest felt harder, smaller, like he had to struggle to breathe. Another fun symptom to his catalogue.

"So you told Chloe?" he asked.

"Yes."

Felix guffawed. He could not help it.

"You really told her that we are vampires?" he asked in disbelief.

"He did," Chloe confirmed.

Another bout of choking laughter seized him. "Well, shite, the world really is going to end, if Alec broke one of Aro's rules."

Alec tensed. Felix could practically sense the other vampire's muscles vibrate into a locked posture.

"I don't see why that's funny," he replied.

"Not surprised there," Felix exhaled. "If you thought something was funny, God help us, the sky would rain fiery rocks and crush us all." He swiped a lock of hair off his forehead. This was too rich. After all of Alec's hassling him to follow the rules when it no longer mattered, he went and broke one of Aro's strictest rules. "Seriously, aren't you afraid that the all knowing Aro will seek vengeance on you from the beyond?"

Alec ground his jaw. Then he said, with an inhumanly steady rhythm, "I told her so she could save your life you imbecilic ass."

Felix's laughing fit was gone - boom - like that, but not soon enough for Alec, who pushed himself from the shaded ground and whipped off to who knew where.

It was several minutes before Felix was able to find his voice. "Oh, shite."

He looked to Chloe.

"You deserved that," Chloe offered helpfully.

"I know," Felix groaned. Why was Chloe sticking up for Alec? Since when did they become best buddies?

His head hurt.

The virus thrust him into a semiconscious loop.

When Felix next awakened, he asked, "How long has it been?"

Chloe looked down at her wristwatch. "Only a half an hour?"

"Only?"

"Last time he was gone for almost eight hours."

She had no doubts that Alec would return. She and Felix were in too precarious states to be abandoned completely. Felix did not share that same confidence.

"Why do you have a wristwatch, anyway?" Felix muttered, trying to distract himself. "I thought all you young people used cell phones for all your time keeping."

Chloe cocked an eyebrow. "Not me. I don't like not knowing what time it is. Besides," she grinned as if confiding a secret, "it makes me feel professional."

"I see."

"And what do you mean, you young people? I'm sure you're younger than me biologically."

"Nineteen," Felix revealed. He was nineteen when he was waylaid by that saucy chit who turned him "What about you?"

"Twenty-four."

"Twenty-four? That's geriatric," he mock exclaimed.

A fresh laugh pealed out of her.

"So how did you turn into a vampire?" she asked after her laughter settled.

"I ran away from home and into the wrong girl."

"I wasn't aware that nineteen year old men could run away."

"From where I came from you could," Felix informed her tiredly. "My family were hardscrabble shepherders in the Lowlands. They did not know any other life and they did not want to. I was supposed to marry a local girl and carry on the tradition of drudgery. But instead I ventured to Edinborough, then London."

His family probably never forgave him. He had told them where he was going and what he had planned to do, but they insisted on believing he left home merely for the sake of disobeying them. When he left, that was the last he saw of them or his younger siblings.

Chloe leaned her head against the tree bark. "What did you do there?"

"Mostly I lived as an itinerant. I took up a couple of apprenticeships, but was booted out for insubordinance. Then I was turned - about six months later - and no longer had to bother with employment."

He dozed off like a narcoleptic and revived a bit later.

"Two hours," Chloe reported. Felix in his semi conscious state, had surfaced often and briefly in the interim. Each time he asked how much time had passed.

The sky had grown dark. Felix had trouble seeing. No light guided him to his surroundings. Chloe was still right by him. She had put the jackets back on.

"Should we look for him?" he asked.

She shook her head, clearly questioning his ability to look for anyone. "I promised I would not leave you alone."

"Was that before or after Alec walked off in a hissy fit?"

"Before, but it doesn't matter. He's not going to leave us out here."

"I'm not too sure of that."

She was. She had heard the venom in Alec's voice at the prospect of that vampire doctor letting Felix die out of vengeance. She had seen his strange mournful regard for her when he said, "You sound like Felix."

"He'll come back," she stated.

Felix turned his head as much as his aching muscles would allow. "How can you be sure?"

"We talked."

"You talked?" he echoed, incredulous. Again he questioned if he was dreaming. Alec did not talk to anyone. The only one he would want to talk to was Jane, and they had that twin telepathy instead.

She shrugged, her shoulders of her coats scraping against the bark. "Yeah. It's not like we had much else to do these past few days."

"How?"

"How what?"

"How did you talk to him?" _And not manage to piss him off_, he silently finished.

"I just opened my mouth and said stuff," Chloe answered glibly. "It's not hard."

"I believe the last attempt proved otherwise." Felix could cite other examples that Chloe had witnessed. The point was it seemed like every time he opened his mouth, he set off Alec's volatile temper. She certainly must have noticed that.

It was not like he was the only one. Demitri, Heidi, Afton, all the Volturi had complained about the same thing. Everyone except Aro and Jane.

Except, now that he thought about it, they had not mentioned this frustration more than once. In fact, most of them had not so much voiced it themselves but instead passively agreed when he complained. Heidi was the only one he could clearly remember venting about the difficult Witch Twin. Not that that proved anything: they just did not want to provoke Jane.

Chloe lifted her head from the tree trunk. "How do you live in the same place with someone and not know how to talk to them?"

"Just because we went on assignments together, with Jane and Demitri, it doesn't mean we were ever close. He was mostly with Jane, anyway. And I'm not exaggerating. I can count on one hand how many times I had seen him without his sister glommed to his side. And if you think he's protective about his personal life . . ."

"I don't."

Smarmy. "But Jane was downright fanatical about it," Felix finished. "I used to think Demitri was suicidal in trying get Jane's attention. I still don't know how he succeeded in wooing her."

Chloe gathered this new revelation. "You talk about them like they're the same entity," she commented, absent of judgment.

"Back then, they practically were. I swear until recently they never even referred to themselves as I or me. It was always we, we, we."

She chuckled.

"Sure, it's funny to you, but when you listen to it for over two centuries it gets a little creepy."

"I guess," Chloe said more sympathetically.

_Maybe that's the answer_, Felix thought. Because Chloe never met Jane. She could talk to Alec on her own terms without the threat of a wrathful Jane looming over her head. Nobody understood how goddamn scary Jane was until they met her. No, Felix did not feel ashamed in admitting it. Jane was scary like the girl in The Ring or one of those kids in The Village of the Damned. They were popular horror movies for a reason.

Then Chloe smiled sweetly. "Did you try not laughing at him?"

Chloe must be feeling very safe right now to goad him.

"I was not laughing at him," he snapped as his headache resumed its pounding. "Anyway, he deserved it. He got on my case about not disposing of . . ."

Hell, he almost admitted he killed her friends. That was the last thing she needed to hear.

Felix rambled, "He thinks just because he and Jane were Aro's pets and he's got a cool power that he can boss me around. It's utter cockshit. You know until the virus he's never lived a day without the Volturi's protection. Jane or Aro or somebody was always there to take care of him. At least I can go off on my own and I'd be fine . . ."

The tightness in his chest and the dizziness reminded him otherwise. He was not fine. He would die soon. Chloe was weakened from blood loss and vulnerable to the hazards of the weather. And Alec was one hundred percent healthy and invincible.

Why?

It was not just luck. He had contracted the virus, but Alec and Chloe had escaped the ravages of the disease. Both of them had been exposed countless times, but the virus did not affect them at all.

After a hesitant moment, Chloe said, "I don't think anyone could survive this alone."

She was wrong. They could, Alec and Chloe. It was not just luck. They were immune. Unless there were other survivors, they would have no choice but to survive on their own.

Felix's anger had fled. This new puzzle demanded his attention. What did they have in common, a caring human and a misanthropic vampire, that would save them? Could it apply to other humans and vampires? Was the cure right in front of him?

He turned these thoughts over in his mind until he was too exhausted to think anymore. Then he lapsed back into his dead sleep.


	15. Chapter 15

Alec did not go very far. He couldn't, with Felix and Chloe in their weakened conditions. Once the sting of Felix's taunts faded some, he turned back. But he did not want to face them. He concealed himself in a thick copse and watched them, in case any kind of trouble beset them.

He heard Felix's rants, none of which was new information. Felix had few qualms about expressing his thoughts in any situation.

"He's just jealous because he doesn't have powers like us," Jane had often rationalized, after Felix had exploded at them. She must have sensed that deep loathing that constantly boiled within the other vampire, but she did not care. Felix was hired muscle, and he had no other value, and she did not care what a vampire of little value thought of her. Alec should not care, either.

What was wrong with him, that he was letting Felix's vulgar opinions get to him?

They were asleep now, the canopy of pines sheltering them. Alec had planned on finding another abandoned house for them to spend the night. He did not want to risk Chloe's fragile core temperature again. Another promise broken.

He pulled himself up and wandered over to them. The night was warmer than it had been a while ago. He lay a few fingers at her neck anyway. It felt warm. Maybe a little warmer than normal. She mentioned something about the possibility of an infection.

Frowning, Alec crouched across from them. His jeans were shredded and grungy from the multiple soakings he had taken recently. He thought of the wardrobe full of clean clothes awaiting him at the castle, but they may as well have been stowed away on Neptune. Aro would have thrown a fit if he had seen one of his guards looking like this.

Felix stirred. "Alec?" he asked, squinting hard in Alec's direction.

"Yes," Alec identified himself.

"What the hell took you so long?" Felix rocketed forward, trying to sit up. He collapsed, panting.

"Do you really need to ask?" Alec maintained a calm facade, though his chest clenched with a phantom seizure.

"Look, I'm sorry, okay?" Felix's voice was strangely pinched, as if he were close to tears. "I don't know what I'm saying, I am in such immense pain."

Alec refrained from pointing out that that excuse had, in effect, nullified his apology.

"Where are you hurting?" he asked. "Is it your stomach again?"

"No, my head and my throat. My chest. I can't breathe."

Alec crawled over to the ailing vampire and applied a mild numbing spell. Felix stopped writhing at his touch.

"Thanks," Felix slurred.

"Doesn't it bother you that you can't move?"

"Can hardly move anyway." Felix blinked fast. "Not long before it's yours, huh?" He coughed out the h sound at the end.

"What are you talking about?" Alec asked, trying not to sound as concerned, or as panicked, as he felt.

"Nothing. Crazy dream."

He shut his eyes, not inclined to talk anymore.


	16. Chapter 16

"It's been two weeks'" Chloe announced, "since the first case of the Surprise Virus presented."

"That so?" Alec replied, not terribly interested.

"And look at where we're at now."

They had reached Popoli, which marked part of the border of the original quarantine area. The virus, however, clearly had not confined to the borders. Popoli was as dead as Volterrra. Officials in Hazmat suits lay among the townspeople in temporary tents most of which were stained with fetid blood. Some of the machines hissed, chugging along in effort to revive the causalties.

The narrow streets of Popoli were mostly empty. A few corpses, made leathery by the sun, lay in the street. They had been running errands and were caught unaware by the sudden eruption of their blood vessels. Most of the buildings were closed up and boarded.

"Blood diseases don't usually spread this fast, do they?" Alec questioned Chloe.

"It could if it transmits through skin contact. The virus could be absorbed into the pores if the victim contacted another who was sweating. And," she gestured to a fly-infested butcher stand, "many of them could have eaten infected livestock."

She managed to find the pharmacy without Alec's aid, "farmacia" being one of the few Italian words she had studied before the trip. Predictably, most of the corpses clustered by the entrance of the old building, and, in response, somebody had boarded up the doors and windows with heavy planks.

Seeing Chloe's distress, Alec hoisted Felix against one arm and tore off the blockade to the entrance.

"Thanks" she quipped.

She stumbled into the darkened room, feeling the walls beside her for a light switch.

"Help me find the light."

"There might not be one," Alec said, handing her his lighter.

She flared the lighter and glided it past the shelves. Despite its old fashioned exterior, the pharmacy had stocked all the modern amenities. She pocketed some penicillin (that ever present threat of blood infection) and rolls of bandages, tissues and Bactine. Then she studied a bottle of aspirin.

"Alec?" She turned and yelped as she stumbled over something jutting out of the aisle. Another corpse. This one, sheathed in a white lab coat, looked to be the pharmacist.

"Are you all right?" Alec called from the entrance.

"Yeah. I just tripped. What are you doing over there?"

"Checking their phones. So far none of them work."

It seemed a futile effort, but Chloe wanted a working phone as badly as he did, so she said nothing against it.

She rounded the aisle and found an assortment of hygiene products. She slipped some tampons in her backpack (as she would need those in a few days) and then, as if on impulse, loaded her arms with soap, shampoo, and lady's razors. So far, all she had been able to do was brush her teeth and touch up her deodorant (and she was running low on both toothpaste and deodorant) but if they set up in a house here, maybe she would finally be able to take a bath. And, to conclude her victorious splurge, she picked up a roll of toilet paper.

She spilled her finds on the pill counter and groped around for a bag. A row of satchels bloomed out from the wall. Chloe grabbed one and stashed all of her beauty products inside.

When she finished, she stepped back outside. Alec crouched beside a clump of discarded cell phones. "Any luck?"

He shook his head, eyeing the inoperative devices with hatred.

"I got some soap and shampoo," Chloe suggested. "Let's find a house so I can take a bath."

"Fine." Alec did not relish the idea; it felt like giving up. Nevertheless, he followed after her. Maybe one of the houses had a landline.

A lively smell wafted from one of the houses at the end of the street. Alec stopped and sniffed. "This one," he said, pointing toward one of the unboarded houses.

The lady of the house lounged in the sitting room, as she lay down for a mid-afternoon nap and never woke up. Alec set Felix on a chair opposite her. He lifted the woman to find a heavy stain of dried blood.

It appeared they would be better off dumping the settee as well.

Chloe felt a pang of remorse. It was one thing to raid a store of things that technically belonged to no one; it was another to toss a dead woman out of her home.

"Maybe we should find an empty house."

"That's not likely," he informed her. "This isn't a summer resort. Every house is bound to have at least one corpse."

"I . . . I don't think we should move her," Chloe said, wavering. "It's not right."

"It's unsanitary to leave her here if we stay," Alec argued, however gently. "Chloe, she's past caring."

He did not want to waste time arguing when he could be looking for that peculiarly tantalizing smell. It promised an invigorating taste that he sorely missed. Frustrated, Alec cast his gaze around the room.

"Look," he said, pointing out a small, enclosed garden abutting the back of the house. "We can put her out there. Technically, she'll still be in her home."

The corners of her mouth lowered. Chloe was not entirely satisfied with this solution, but for a corpse, she contended, there were much worse places to end up than in one's home garden.

"I guess it'll have to do."

Thankfully she did not have to help Alec transport the woman and the settee outside. Alec's superstrength saved her from that involvement in their desecration. She kept Felix company. Felix slumped forward in the chair. Chloe test jostled him, but he did not respond.

"I suppose there's an empty bed upstairs," she said, to no one in particular. She repeated that comment to Alec. He nodded readily, then lifted Felix and climbed up the stairs.

The second floor was empty, much to Chloe's relief. There were two bedrooms. They settled Felix in the smaller of the two bedrooms. It looked like a guest room, as it was decorated with generic furniture and knickknacks. Chloe voiced her preference for this room.

It had an adjoining bathroom, with a small tub and shower. Chloe tested the faucet and almost cried with joy when water spurted out.

Well water, she deduced. No big agency to shut it off. The water was not heated, but its temperature was bearable, and at that moment, Chloe desired cleanliness more than warmth.

"I suppose you want the first turn," Alec said wrily.

"Yes please," she begged.

"All right, but shut the door."

She did and he left the room. He had no ulterior motive for suggesting Chloe shut the door other than the fear of Felix suddenly awakening and playing peeping Tom.

The scent had gotten stronger when they reached the second floor. Alec deduced it came from above them. He checked the other two doors, one which opened to a stairwell.

A nursery encompassed the entire third floor. The windows framed patches of soft light into the center of the room. A playpen structured hexagonally at that center, where a two-year-old girl tucked on her side. Her blood pulsed weakly in her small body, but he could not detect even a trace of the virus in her.

Alec stood over the playpen, too awestruck to notice the hunger flooding his eyes. Over the past few days he had forgotten what it was like to drink nourishing blood, but now his body reminded him with a vengeance.

The girl stirred awake. Her sleepy eyes gazed absently at him. She crooked her arm under her head.

"Mama?" Her speech came out in a hoarse whisper. The girl was hungry; she must be, judging from the state of decay they found the woman in.

He shifted the playpen open.

"No."

He gathered her up. She wrapped her chubby arms around him, too weak and too trusting to fight him, and he carried her downstairs.

Felix could have half of her.


	17. Chapter 17

He was a fool to think Chloe would not find out.

Long after she relaxed from her bath, she resumed her daily duties. So when she took out her knife, Alec tried to save her the trouble.

"You don't have to do that today."

"Why not?" she asked, the blade poised at her wound.

Alec had not prepared for these questions. Foolish. Chloe never accepted vague explanations. She needled away until she exposed every secret.

"I found a survivor, so I gave some of the blood to Felix and I took the rest."

She gaped soundlessly at him.

"You found a survivor?" she finally squeaked. "And you ate him?"

"Her," Alec corrected. "I was hungry. And like I said, I gave half the blood to Felix."

She threw down the knife, where it pinged against the radiator.

"Where's the body?" she interrogated breathlessly.

"You don't need to see it."

"Yes I do," she said, enraged. "If someone else survived this long, it could tell us what we need to know to find a cure."

He had not thought of that. He had thought of nothing but his hunger when he found the child. After all, he had vowed to take the next healthy human he found, no matter who the human was. He did not particularly like that that next healthy human was a small child, but after those long days of searching in vain for another source of food - of searching among deer and birds, for Christ's sake - he counted himself lucky he even found her. It was not his proudest moment.

Felix needed the blood. Chloe needed time for her blood to replenish. If they kept using her at their current rate, she would not last much longer.

Chloe, incensed by his silence, leaned toward him, clamping a hand on his arm. He shook it off

"Where is the body?" she growled. "I need to see it."

"All right," Alec said, as he led her to the garden. "But you're going to wish you hadn't asked."

His prophecy was the biggest understatement yet.

Chloe took one look at the body he laid out next to her mother and raced back inside to the bathroom to vomit.

She staggered back out, her legs shaking and her eyes watery, refusing to look at Alec.

"I'm sorry," Alec said solemnly. "But I was hungry."

She struggled to remind herself she should not get angry. This was what vampires ate. And while she and Felix at least had daily meals, Alec had abstained from his food the entire time since she encountered them at the bridge. She should not have expected he would waste away for his newly discovered love for humans.

"You could have told me," she said. "You could have told me you needed blood."

"No. Felix needs it. You don't have enough for two of us."

"How could you?" The accusation shot out of her. "How could you kill a child?"

His renewed red eyes flashed. "Please don't take this the wrong way, Chloe, but humans are food to us. There isn't any more to it. Do you think we could survive on leaves and berries? And I don't see you wallowing in remorse over the number of cows and pigs and chickens you slaughter for your food."

"So what does that make me?" Chloe asked, chilly. "A back up meal?"

Her fingers trailed down to the cut she repeatedly inflicted on herself, and the answer was revealed.

"We didn't twist your arm to do this," Alec reminded her. "As I recall, it was the other way around. But you are in no way bound to this duty if it disgusts you. You are free to leave if you wish, and we will not impose any penalty on you for your decision."

"So I'm the one that has to leave?" Chloe shrilled irrationally. If her life meant anything to her, she would dash out the door and . . . and go where?

"Very well, Felix and I will leave." Alec rose.

"You'll take Felix with you?"

"You should be relieved. You won't have to serve as a back up meal if there are no vampires around."

"And how do you plan to keep him alive if I'm not here to feed him?" Chloe asked. If her theory held, Felix would die. Not that Alec seemed to care.

"We'll find a way."

"You're trying to guilt me, aren't you?" Chloe suspected out loud.

"No I'm not. I'm merely addressing the reality. We're all in a shitty situation. Felix might die. We all might die. Everyone else has." Alec let out a labored sigh. "I don't want to force you to do something you don't want to do."

He was right, at least about their lack of options.

Holding on to her last vestige of pride, she shouted, "Fine. But for your information, I'm staying because of Felix, not you. Felix doesn't deserve to be left to die because you're a psychopath."

"Understood," he replied evenly.

She clomped back inside.

Chloe shut herself in the guest bedroom with Felix. Alec did not try to invite himself in, but he sat outside the door, in case something happened.

He heard Chloe murmuring to Felix, though it did not sound as if Felix had risen from his long nap. Sharing in the popular theory that coma patients could hear their loved ones speaking to them, he guessed. She did not mention the child he killed: but just about everything else: the discovery of the bio team, the search through the pharmacy, and other unprovocative topics.

Jane had done that with Alec, after he had gotten out of that unspeakable place. During that period, he had hovered between life and death, unable to move, see or feel. Unlike Chloe, Jane was not much of a talker, but she rambled on about every little thought that popped into her head in an attempt to keep him anchored to her. He did not know or remember much of what she said, but he knew she was there.

He tried to reach for her now, just to know if she was safe and free of that rampaging disease.

He could not sense her, but then he did not feel that she was dead, either.

Outside of the house, the town was absolutely silent.


	18. Chapter 18

After the sun rose, Chloe emerged from the bedroom and nearly tripped over Alec's legs. He pulled them in at the last second.

She blinked her bleary eyes. "Will you help me examine the body?"

"You are going to do that?" Alec asked carefully, wondering if he was mistaken of which body she referred to and, at the same time, not wanting to ask.

Chloe lifted her shoulders, though her grimace belied her casual attitude.

"She's dead, and it needs to be done." _And if we find a cure soon, you won't have to kill the next toddler we run into, _she reasoned to herself. "Can I trust you to carry her into the kitchen?"

"The light's better outside."

"The garden's not sterile enough. I don't want to risk contaminating the evidence. The kitchen's the best we can do."

"Did you take a flashlight from the pharmacy?"

"No. I'll go get one now. And rubber gloves. You go wash up."

The entire conversation sounded odd, toneless. Not altogether unusual for Alec, but without her warm, effusive chirps, Chloe could well have become a completely different person.

Chloe had seen a few cadaver dissections during her undergrad classes, but nothing near enough to prepare her for this.

She insisted on helping to carry in the body, though Alec did not need the help. The toddler's head fell to the side, her neck hinging against his arm. So she examined the neck first. Though it was hard to tell without seeing the effect on the blood (all the blood had vanished into Alec and Felix's stomachs) she thought - she hoped - that the broken neck was the cause of death.

She almost believed it was. He would not want the girl to suffer.

"Turn on the light," she directed. Alec did so, aiming it at her hands as she prodded against the girl's empty arteries.

"What are you hoping to find there?" Alec asked, his voice absent of emotion. Of guilt.

"I don't know. Anything that might explain . . . why she didn't . . ." Chloe could not finish. The circumstances were too unfair.

She stepped back and breathed deeply before she could resume her examination. Alec kept the light aimed at the girl's neck. The light did not waver even slightly.

"Is this . . . how it usually looks?" Chloe braved asking. She herself had no visual basis of comparison.

"More or less" was his robotic answer.

"I'm going to check her eyes," Chloe decided. The eyes and wrists were the biggest visual points of the virus. He slid the light up to the girl's face. Chloe could not help glancing his way as the child's face illuminated. Nothing. Not even a bat of his eye.

The girl's eyes were closed. Chloe's rubbery fingers brushed against the tiny eyelid but she could not get enough grip to hold it.

"Do you want me to do that?" Alec volunteered.

"I can do it," Chloe said desperately.

"You're shaking too much. It's better if I do it."

She tried again, but the tremors in her hands increased.

"All right," she conceded, "but don't hurt her."

With his free hand, Alec brushed the eyelid back and it popped open like a doll's. His procedure did not seem that much different from what she had tried. Chloe granted that he was gentle.

She leaned over to get a closer look at the eye. She thought she saw a bit of yellow in the eye, but in the next second it vanished. It could have been anything: a reflection of the flashlight beam.

"The other eye."

The same peculiar flash of yellow met her when Alec opened the girl's other eye.

Chloe kept her voice neutral. "Did you see anything odd?"

He answered just as neutrally. "There was a dot in her iris. It circled around her eye. Then it was gone."

"Which eye?"

"Both of them."

She let down her skepticism. "Did you see the flash?"

He lowered the beam. "No flash. But the dot was moving fast. I suppose to humans it would look like a flash."

_Great_, she groaned to herself. _A virus that moves at vampire speed_.

"What color was the dot?" she asked.

He caught on. "What color was the flash?"

She could easily venture a guess on the color of Alec's dot: it would match the color of her flash. The same color that pervaded the unfortunate patients of this new disease. But if the two of them saw it, chances were it was not only their imaginations.

"It's possible that it means she had the virus."

Alec shook his head, his eyes evading hers. "She did not have the smell. Or the taste."

"It could have been in the early stages," Chloe speculated. "By which I mean the really early stages. She could have contracted the virus, like, seconds before you killed her."

"How is that possible?" he asked, growing defensive.

"Just because we had not succumbed ourselves doesn't mean we can't transmit the virus to others," she theorized. She had harbored that theory ever since Felix collapsed, but had kept it to herself.

The flashlight burst in his hand, and they were plunged back into the grey shadows.

"I'll get another one," Alec finally said, his voice thin like he was tired.

"Leave the gloves here," Chloe instructed. She winced as he snapped them off, though she was sure the hard motions had not hurt him in the least.

While he was gone, she stepped into the garden and viewed the mother. Unlike the child, who had appeared as if she were peacefully asleep, there was no mistaking that the mother was dead. Rigor mortis had contorted the woman's face into a gaunt mask, and the stench was strong enough to make Chloe's eyes water.

Chloe held her breath and approached to get a better look at the woman's face. Her eyelids receded under sagging, yellow tinged corneas. The yellow rings that were the hallmark of the disease showed clearly.

Which affirmed Chloe's hypothesis. It was highly unlikely that the woman had contracted the disease, then lay down for a two or three day nap before the virus finished her off, and equally as unlikely that the woman avoided touching her daughter in those days. Unless she had a vampire sniff it out of her, she would not have known she had the virus.

And the question arose. Why did the child contract the disease from Alec and not from the mother?

Or did it really take so long for the virus to surface?

Alec retrieved all the remaining flashlights and batteries from the pharmacy and carried them back.

Chloe was in the garden, so he piled the tools on the table and dashed up quickly to check on Felix.

Felix had not moved from his position since yesterday. Alec hesitated at the door, though the damage was already done.

It could have been him or Chloe that had passed the virus to him. Both of them had been exposed: himself by Gianna and her by Vincent. Except that when Chloe learned Vincent was infected, she had the brains to separate from him. Whereas he knew Gianna was sick but insisted on relaying her to Aro, where she could spread the disease to the Volturi from the top down. Not to mention that neither he or Felix would be stuck in this position if he had not had the compulsion to retreat from other guards' judgments.

This happened because he acted like a hormonal teenager.

Aro had taught him better than that.

"I'm sorry," he told the sleeping Felix. "I'm sorry I lured you into this mess."

"Were you upstairs?" Chloe asked, when he returned to the kitchen.

"Yes," Alec said flatly.

"I just wondered." Chloe's voice rose in defense. "It could have been a survivor. Another family member. The immune factor might be hereditary."

"If anyone were alive and in the area, they would not have left her to starve in her playpen."

Chloe nodded, not even flinching at his cold tone.

"Let's finish the examination," she suggested. "I don't think she caught the virus from you - I mean from us."

_Then why did you say so in the first place_? Alec growled in thought, but he kept his mouth clenched shut.

"It's the simplest explanation," she added unprovoked, "but there are too many holes. It's illogical that she would avoid all sources of exposure until now. And if she contracted the virus through us, her eyes would stay yellow. There is something else going on."

She grabbed a flashlight from the bag and crammed the batteries in. After testing the beam, she turned it to the girl's wrists. Nothing she saw in the exsanguinated veins confirmed her glimmer of a new idea.

She did see identical tiny marks embedded in the girl's inner arm. Teeth marks. Rodent teeth marks.

Alec spotted the scar. "What's that?"

"She must have scratched herself on the playpen fencing," Chloe lied.

Alec roamed away, ostensibly to glance out at the garden and check on the mother's body.

"We shouldn't stay here much longer," he said, tightly controlled. "Humans can get sick from being around dead bodies."

"I guess there's not much more we can do here," Chloe agreed. She focused on the child's eyes again, searching for the yellow flash. "Help me finish with her first."

"Haven't you finished yet?" Disgust seeped out of his loathing glare.

"I've hardly begun. I have to open her up, analyze her organs. Unfortunately we don't have the technology or the expertise to do complete tests. But anything we find out might help us in the future."

Even saying those words made her wonder if she had broken, if she had transformed into a ghoul.

He pushed away from the doorjamb. "Okay, I'm flummoxed. Why all of a sudden are you determined to cut her open?"

"I think she did have the virus," Chloe finally revealed. "Then she got better."

"How?" He asked automatically. No pause. Chloe's message had not sunk in.

"I don't know," Chloe admitted. "That's what I need to find out."


	19. Chapter 19

After the autopsy, they joined the body of the child with her mother in the garden and buried them both under a flower patch.

Chloe lumbered upstairs and fed Felix, then filled the bathtub for another long soak. Despite the breakthrough over the autopsy, the past couple of days still weighed on her. She hoped she would never have to repeat such a hopeless ordeal again. Even though she recognized it was wishful thinking: hopeless ordeals were part of a doctor's baggage. Still, she thought she would have eased more gracefully into the unavoidable tragedies that attached to the medical profession.

After her fingers and toes pruned, she clambered out, dressed in one of the hostess's robes and curled onto the settee by the window. She and Alec planned to leave Popoli first thing next morning, and Chloe was not the least bit sorry to go. The memories would not be so jarring once they got out of this place full of death.

They were back in the wilderness. The relentless sun blazed down during the day. Chloe hardly noticed the vampires' glitter anymore, nor did Alec make any attempt to stay in the shade. They had encountered no living person since Popoli.

Felix had not awakened at all in Popoli or after.

They neared the ocean. Ordinarily it might not have taken so long to travel the last few miles to the coast except for Chloe's increasingly longer daytime rests. Alec did not discourage them. Every ounce Chloe sweated was an ounce less blood for Felix.

Chloe was silent when she walked. A first.

It was on the first rest stop when she deigned to speak to him.

"When did you stop caring?"

"About what?" Alec replied, cautious.

"When did you stop caring about eating humans?"

If she wanted some confession of regret and soul rendering torment, she was not going to get it. Alec guessed she would not like to hear that after he turned he took to his new diet without any qualms. No, that was not exactly true: Jane took to it without any qualms (at least without any qualms that she ever shared with him.) He had had a moment of moral recognition, but it was quickly extinguished by his fears of disappointing Jane and disappointing his new master. He had not wanted to risk getting them tossed out of Volterra or ignominously erased. He could not let her die that way again.

He could not explain that to Chloe without coming off as a self professed martyr. He had chosen this life, despite what mind games he used at the time to justify his choice. Even if he had known of the alternative lifestyle, he would have chosen the same.

"You shouldn't ask questions you won't like the answers to," he warned instead.

"How do you know I won't like the answer?"

"Because you're a nice person and it's not a nice answer," he said, not putting any energy into his flattery.

"Nice." She let out a hard laugh. "That's kind of a loose definition, isn't it? At what point does someone stop being considered nice? Most people would say cutting open a dead little girl is not what a nice person does."

If he had known Chloe had posed her question because she was wrangling with her own conscience, he might have told her the truth. Or not. He still was not in the mood for confessions.

In an attempt to appease her, though, he pointed out, "Isn't that what doctors do? Cut people open?"

"Not like that. Besides, I wasn't training to be a surgeon or a mortician."

"So you were planning on curing your patients by handing out lollipops?" he reasoned.

"Of course not." Chloe pressed her hands to her eyes. She was going to cry. She was going to cry away more fluid that Felix needed.

"That girl was dead, Chloe," he tried to remind her. "There was nothing you could do for her or for her mother or for anyone else who died from this virus. You can't save everyone."

"That's not the point," she gasped.

"Then could you please explain what the point is, because I'm not getting it."

She lifted her head, her red rimmed eyes meeting his. "I think you get it just fine."

With that cryptic reply, she clambered up.

"I'm going to the bathroom," she announced, knowing that would prevent him from following her. So she could cry in peace.

She would not bring up the girl's death again.


	20. Chapter 20

The next morning (Felix still had not moved), Chloe stopped for the bathroom again.

"Again?" Alec complained.

"Yes, again."

She crouched in the distant enclosure in the woods and several minutes later she slunk back, bearing her sealed garbage bag, which emitted a smell like foul blood.

"Should I be concerned?" Alec asked.

"Why?" she asked, genuinely puzzled.

"Your garbage smells like blood."

Chloe's lips pursed shut, signaling that she was holding back a laugh or another crying jag.

"If you must know," she explained stiffly, once she was able to contain her hysterics, "I'm menstruating."

From the disgusted look that flickered across Alec's face, she guessed he was sorry he asked.

"It's not that big a deal," she added defensively. I picked up some supplies in Popoli. It's under control. This can't be that new to you. Your sister must have had hers."

"Not for over seven hundred years."

Right, Chloe reminded herself. And seven hundred years ago, they would not have had all the kids watch film strips about their changing bodies.

"There's nothing much to it," Chloe explained, switching to medical school mode. "All I have to do is wear something to catch the blood. And -because I know you'll ask - menstrual blood is different than regular blood. It comes from a different place, so it won't affect Felix's food supply."

Alec was not going to ask, if for no other reason than it would have prolonged the conversation past its already intolerable length. Nonetheless, he asked, "What about pain?"

"It doesn't hurt."

Alec narrowed his eyes at her and frowned suspiciously. "You know you don't have to lie about it if it does."

"Why would I lie about it?" Chloe balled the plastic bag tighter in her fist.

"I don't know. But sometimes Jane would visit this woman and get herbs for her pains when she was bleeding."

"Oh, for cramps," Chloe deduced. "I don't really get cramps. Has Jane told you about all of this?"

"Not explicitly. But we lived in a small house without a bathroom. She couldn't exactly hide it."

"I guess." Chloe could hardly imagine trying to cope with her period in such close quarters with her own brother - during the Middle Ages, no less. Though in the retrospective lens of her adulthood, it was not such a big deal that he would know, but when she was that age (she guessed Alec was fifteen or sixteen) she would have been mortified beyond belief if she thought any male knew about it. She pondered whether Jane had had the same embarrassment, or if the slightly altered circumstances (Alec's being closer to her age than Evan was to Chloe's, the lack of a bathroom) had reduced it to a utilitarian annoyance.

"You're lucky that you have Jane," she observed. "And that she's still alive." Chloe held to the belief that everyone at home was still alive until she heard otherwise.

"I know," he replied in a barely audible voice.

She chattered on, as Alec's suddenly sour mood made her nervous. "I'm sure my family is still alive, too. Though Evan and I aren't as close as you and Jane. For one thing, he's five years older than me. He doesn't even live in Queens anymore; he's in the Bronx with his wife and son. But we still see each other often. His wife, Della, is pretty nice."

The flurry of words passed through her lips before she let herself question how much of that information was still relevant. After all, the plague could have forced her family to move out of New York into the country. Or they could be stuck in some quarantine area.

She could not begin to comprehend the changes she would face when she returned home. All that mattered, though, was that they survived. They just had to have survived.

They stopped briefly in Pescara. Pescara was more populous and, as a result, bore more decaying bodies than Popoli. Because of the overwhelming stench and the incipient sanitation obstacles, they did not stay long - long enough only for Chloe to steal another bath and for Alec to search for any survivors. She made him promise to bring any survivors he found back alive. Unfortunately, his promise was not tested. Everyone in this city had long since died or fled.

Nonetheless, when he reported that to her, she had the gall to check his eyes and was satisfied to find them a deeper crimson than when she last saw him.

"But then," she continued with her mind game, "you could have given all the blood to Felix."

While he dismissed it as a joke, she strode over to the bench where Felix lay to check.

"Are you completely paranoid," he asked.

"Not at all," she said. Seeing Felix's eyes were no brighter than before, she let the lid fall back shut. "I should have checked him first. If you were to sneak in a meal, you would more likely give it to him."

"Like I would do that," Alec said reflexively.

Chloe tapped her bandaged elbow. "That's exactly what you have been doing."

Her scrutiny made him restless. He stood from the bench. "Now that you're satisfied that we're not cheating bastards, can we go?"

"Sure," Chloe said, grinning a teasing grin.


	21. Chapter 21

After another monotonous day, in which they wended indirectly north, they arrived within sight of the ocean.

A promontory extended about forty feet high, overlooking the deceptively calm blue waters. What little waves there were splashed onto the jagged rocks below. Except for a lethargic breeze, everything was still: the sky a cloudless blue and the few boats, occupied by the corpses of fishermen drifting a set distance from the shore.

Then Chloe did something incredibly stupid.

She scampered to the edge of the cliff, trying to climb down to the shoreline. Rushing down like a lemming, and that observation proved too prophetic for Alec's comfort, because the ground rumbled under her.

The stupid human had dislodged some large rocks in her mad dash: some large, heavy rocks which were now tumbling down after her.

He dropped Felix and jumped down after her, clearing over any more potential rockslides, but the law of gravity meant that he moved slower than he ordinarily would. Meanwhile, Chloe had heard the rocks crashing down, but her reflexes were slow from blood loss and whatever human conditions presently affected her. She scooted away, closer to Alec's direction, and he had just reached her when the heaviest boulders struck.

He pushed her down, covering her fragile body with his. The boulders smashed into pieces on his back. The cliffside buried them.

After several nerve-shattering minutes, the earth was silent once more.

Alec shrugged off the rocks that pinned them down. The cracks in his own stonelike skin sealed themselves; the trivial pain fled. He climbed to a stand and reached for Chloe to help her up.

He was not alarmed when he smelled her blood, assuming she must have scratched herself on one of the smaller sharp rocks that rained down warning of the cliff wall's imminent collapse. She lay, her eyes spread wide open in her shock, her mouth molded open in an O. She twitched and gasped, but she did not sit up.

"Chloe." Alec pulled her up. He was surprised at the dead weight - at the resistance. Underneath her the rocks were smeared with blood. Too much blood for a minor cut.

"Are you okay?" he tried asking. She gulped but emitted no sound. "Answer me."

Why did she not talk? This human always wanted to talk, and now he was commanding her to talk and she wouldn't.

He imagined she would be too bruised to walk, so he lifted her up. When his hand passed under her head, he noticed a mushy spot where her skull had dented. Her dark hair was matted with blood and white matter: pieces of skull and her brains.

He had shielded her from the rocks above but he must have . . . the rocks must have . . . she must have landed too hard on the shore.

He hoisted her over the shoulder and scrambled up the shore, mincing carefully around the unstable land. He had to find humans. They could fix this, right? They made advances in healing head trauma. If he could find a doctor . . .

They should have been heading north all along, where logic dictated they would more likely find survivors. But he and Felix had taken Chloe further south instead, in effect isolating themselves on the peninsula. Then they mindlessly roamed east, then continued to roam east because Chloe had to see the ocean . . .

He stopped, realizing he should go back and get Felix. He could not leave him. But he might not have time . . .

His fingers skated down to Chloe's wrist. Checking for a pulse was one of the few medical things he knew how to do.

She was moving so she had to have a pulse.

The artery gave two weak flutters and then stopped.

He waited. He counted seconds because it was the only accurate way to track the passage of time.

The seconds racked up to a half an hour, then an hour. Not a single beat.


	22. Chapter 22

He carried her back to Felix. He could not wait too long after death or her blood would spoil. He fed the rest of her to Felix and then set about burying her.

He found a spade in the boathouse, but the spade broke when he drove it into the rocky soil.

"Goddamnit!" It was no wonder his language was deteriorating just as everything else in this goddamn world.

He heard a squeak nearby. He would not let her be chewed up by goddamn rats so he gathered her up and dropped her into the ocean, hurling her far enough so the current would not smash her back on the rocks.

"Some backup meal," he muttered as the current washed her away.

He brought Felix back inland. Felix would not care if he could not view the ocean in his last hours, and Alec certainly did not want to look at it.

How long would Felix last without a regular infusion of blood? Alec thought back to the torturous calculations. Five or six days had passed between when Alec discovered Gianna's illness and when Felix discovered the rest of the Volturi had perished. The virus killed its victims in two to three days. If the latter rule applied to vampires, Felix had two to three days. Maybe four. Vampire privilege, he thought. We get one extra day before a painful death.

Though he would have to exclude himself from that set. By now it was abundantly clear that he would not be getting this disease. He did not know why the virus spared him while it attacked nearly every other living or undead creature. He could hope that this immunity extended to Jane, that it was some genetic quirk, and that Chloe was spared because she was some distant relative who carried the same gene. That would be the simple explanation Chloe would give for their fortune. (A fat lot of good it did her.)

That would mean, of course, that Demetri would die, eventually, and Jane would suffer again.

Then Alec came to a darker realization. Was this part of his curse? Everyone dying except Jane and him. Jane, after having had a taste of her free, happy life, would lose everything she had come to love and would return to her former state with him as her shackle.

But for him, Jane could have had a normal life. She could have grown up and married. Or she could have lived out her human life dispensing herbs to the villagers like Henrietta. The nobles' whispers and looks of derision had not marred her in the least. She had the wherewithal to survive nearly anything. Anything, as it turned out, but her brother's betrayal.

The night passed much too quickly. The sun peeked out, beaming its strong dawn rays to the clearing. Annoyed by the glitter on their skin, Alec moved Felix to a more shaded area.

He always hated the glitter, though he supposed it was slightly better than crumbling to ash at the first touch of sunlight. He speculated the glitter was the true source of Aro's vigilance for secrecy, because how were humans supposed to be intimidated by creatures that glittered? Chloe had reacted to his glittering skin with delight, once she recovered from her concern that they were not going to explode. Nice thought.

Felix had been asleep for . . . how long? . . . a week, maybe longer. This was not good. The hours were ticking away.

Alec crouched by Felix. He jabbed at Felix's arm. A warm flush overcame him as he recalled Felix pestering him while he aimed for peace and quiet. He supposed Felix would insist that they were bonding or whatever ridiculous new age label.

Bonding seemed like a good idea now.

Alec settled on the ground.

"You're missing out on your last days on Earth," he told the sleeping vampire. "Not that there's much going on. I could tell you what time it is but I don't have Chloe's watch and you probably wouldn't want to hear it anyway."

"I've said it before, but I'm sorry you got stuck here with me instead of living it up in Geneva. I know I'm not fun to be around and you'd rather spend your last days with anyone else. I kind of liked having you with me. And Chloe, too. But I shouldn't say that, because it was at your expense.

"As for the kiss . . ." Here he found himself stumbling over the right words. He had to address it, though, while there was still time. "I guess you had some reason for doing that. It's probably not my business. I took it too seriously, I understand that. For a moment I thought you were interested and I was glad. I thought it meant . . . because we're always fighting and then that day you dropped the jackass act. It is an act. It would have to be because Aro would never hire anyone who behaved so recklessly. You certainly saw through my act, that I was essentially there to keep Jane under control and because I had a power. You knew right away that without my power I had no real worth. I don't know if anyone else in the Volturi found that out. Except Aro, but he doesn't count.

"I can say this now that I'm no longer constrained by Volturi politics, but I could never have stayed there if it were not what Jane wanted. I didn't like having my every movement and reaction accounted for and used against me. Volterra did not seem that different from my home village, with everyone waiting for one of us to slip up. And Jane thrived in Aro's new role, so if anyone was going to slip up, it would be me. At least this time I learned to draw as little attention as possible. To become what Aro wanted. This was the life Jane wanted. I owed her that."

Alec stopped talking. He was confusing himself with this circular logic, and it would not make any better sense for Felix, if he was listening.

"This is pathetic. I'm talking about this stuff like it still matters. No wonder you'd rather stay asleep. It's like with the rats. Who the hell is still afraid of rats after something that happened over seven hundred years ago? Seven hundreds years and still I fall apart over rats. And it turns out rats are surviving the plague when nothing else on land does. Go figure.

"Okay, I'll shut up now. It's this theory Jane had about talking to someone in their sleep, and it seemed to work for me once," Alec mused. "Maybe I can find a Harry Potter book or something else you'd like and read it aloud."

Felix's brows twitched. Alec guessed he was holding him to that dare.

"I'll see what I can find," he promised solemnly, a small smile played on his lips. He would read endless lists of bawdy limericks if it would keep Felix with him.


	23. Chapter 23

He did not find Harry Potter but a bony preteen human was clutching a backpack full of books in one of the cars outside Pescara. Alec carefully eased the backpack off the corpse and looked through it. The collection consisted mostly of girls' series, but a book titled _City of Ember_ sifted out from the pastel-colored paperbacks. The premise, a subterranean society of humans, might actually be of interest to Felix.

The book was short so Alec took long breaks between chapters. The story was mildly entertaining, but it lacked the artistry of Alec's usual material.

He finished the book a day later.

"That's all there is," he said, clapping the book shut. "If you want for me to get another one, give a sign."

Alec resigned himself to the silence. He spread out on the ground, his arm tingling as it rested against Felix's. Wispy clouds blew above them. He wished the clouds were bigger; he was sick of sunlight. It made his throat burn fiercely. His whole body ached for nourishment. He caught a gnat and licked his hand. If the gnat carried any blood, he could not taste it.

He felt his shoulder jostle and heard Felix cough. He sat up. Felix continued coughing. Blood spurted out of his mouth.

"No! No! NO!" Alec shouted, scrambling up. He tried clamping his mouth over Felix's mouth, to keep the blood in.

Felix was not ready to die. He had at least another day.

A blob of blood hit Alec's knees. It had leaked from Felix's ear. Realizing the futility of his action, Alec lifted his hand. He jumped up, bounced his gaze around. He looked and listened for food. For blood. Any blood.

He heard the soft scramble of clawed feet. If there were anything else . . .

But there wasn't anything else. It was living disease-free mammalian blood. It would have to do.

He dashed for the burrow and smashed his hands in, grabbing as many of the writhing, gnashing creatures as he could hold. He almost dropped them. They would not stay in his hands so he had to press them against his chest. His empty stomach crawled. The round bodies shrieking as the embers from the fiery coals showered on them. Their teeth and claws digging into his torso, scraping aside his flesh so they could shelter in him.

_Stop. _

He ran back to Felix. By the time he reached the other vampire, his legs collapsed under him. He gripped one wriggling rat in his hand while clamping the others close to him. He shoved the rat into Felix's mouth, piercing it against his fangs.

The rat gave out a ghastly shriek before it died, drained of its small volume of blood.

He tossed it aside and repeated the process with the others. Each rat protested right up to the moment of its death. The mound of bodies next to him went ignored for a moment as he willed the blood to stay inside Felix.

It seemed to work. Felix stopped his spasmodic coughs and resumed his stone-still coma. To be sure, Alec lifted Felix's eye. His iris rapidly filled with brown pigment. The yellow swirled and shrank under the growing amber field.

Alec collapsed over him, burying his face in Felix's broad shoulder. He was too weak with relief to move.

Reality slammed in. He had not solved anything. He was back to that same futile wait. He bought Felix a little more time but for what? Should he keep doing this until he ran out of rats?

The crawling and the digging sensations bore deeper into his gut. They persisted until Alec extricated himself from Felix. The mound of rat bodies trembled under the shadows of the tree branches. He crawled up and away.

He pulled Felix to the nearest stream. Then he let himself fall in. The rush of water eased some of the crawling, but it did not completely erase it.


	24. Chapter 24

Felix woke up. The sun hit his eyes exactly on target. He brought up a hand to shield his face - his sparkling face. Oh, right. Chloe knows about that.

He tried to catch the tail end of a dream that seemed to be of monumental importance. He closed his eyes willing himself back to sleep, as that seemed to work the other times. Sleep, however, was determined to elude him.

Goddamnit, he was sure it was important.

He sat up. Maybe Alec could knock him back out. Like last time when he was in such pain. Strange, the pain had disappeared. Felix told himself not to put much hope in it; it could be a lingering effect of Alec's power and the pain could return at any second.

The stream burbled by his ear. He headed towards the stream first. He could smell Alec's scent there. Chloe must be farther away, because her scent was much fainter.

He found the lazy ass meditating under the water, oblivious to tiny fish riding the rush of the stream. Sighing, he plunged his hand in and yanked Alec out.

"If you're trying to kill yourself, you're doing a piss poor job of it."

It was a joke, though Alec did not appear to process that. He cleared the water out of his eyes, blinking but keeping at least one eye fixed on Felix. Felix was caught under the disturbing stare.

"You're . . . okay?"

"For now. And you look like shit." Once again he had command over his accent. "Maybe I should take over the fishing since you're obviously not in a state to handle it . . ."

Alec flung himself at the larger vampire, slamming them both in the ground. Then the memory of Chloe's demise seized him and he scrambled back. "Sorry," he said with what Felix thought was exaggerated remorse

Felix only hitched himself back up to a stand. "The hell did you do that for?"

"Because you're okay," Alec answered breathily, still refusing to make sense.

"Okay," Felix's gaze zipped up and down the stream. "Obviously some company is dumping copious amounts of lithium into this stream, because you've gone insane. Chloe's not drinking from this stream, is she? Where'd you leave her anyway?"

He never saw such ebulliance disappear so fast. Alec drew his knees into his body and slicked a wet spot of grass with his hand.

"She didn't make it." His tone readapted to its signature flatness.

"The virus got her?"

"No. An accident. She hit her head. I'm sorry. I know you liked her."

Felix rubbed the heel of his hand against his forehead. An accident. As Wallace Shawn would put it, inconceivable.

"Where did you put her?" he hissed. He was not angry at Alec specifically. Just angry at the whole timing of it.

"The ocean."

"What ocean?"

"The one lying a couple of miles to your left. What does it matter? It's all the same fucking water."

Felix tilted his head back, stunned. Alec never swore. And though he had not broken from his monotone, there was an edge to his voice that alarmed Felix.

He kicked at the ground. A few more choice words erupted from him. Why didn't anyone wake him? Some pebbles clattered into the stream.

Alec spoke up, almost as if he hoped Felix would be distracted. "The yellow is gone."

"What?"

"From your eyes. The yellow is gone."

Felix bent over the stream, touching his eye. A deeper pool that was less disturbed by the current reflected his eyes, but the water was too murky to discern color.

Alec moved beside him. "Here," he said, handing him Chloe's compact. Felix opened it, peering into the mirror.

"My eyes are brown."

"Animal blood," Alec explained shortly.

"You fed me animal blood?" Felix screeched, outraged.

"After Chloe died, that's all there was."

"I thought all the animals died. Where did you find . . ."

Alec pretended to be busy with Chloe's backpack. Felix remembered that the rats seemed to survive long after the other animals wasted away. He was dumbstruck. Alec hated to be around rats. There was no way he would have pursued them just to get Felix some blood.

"Chloe said that it was important that you stayed full of uninfected blood."

"So you found a cure?" Felix asked stupidly. Of course they found a cure. He was standing here virus free, wasn't he?

Alec's brow wrinkled. "No. Chloe just found a way to stave off death for vampires. We did find someone who got better after getting the disease, but we don't know how that happened."

"Then how did you do this?" Felix referred to himself.

"I have no idea." Alec threw the backpack over his shoulder and sidestepped away from the stream.

Felix dashed in front of him, blocking his path. "What did you do before I woke up?" he persisted.

"I prefer not to think about it."

This exchange did little to change Felix's mind that Alec had gone completely daft.

"You just saved my life, and you prefer not to think about it?"

Alec fixed his fathomlessly black eyes to Felix's. "I did not save your life," he replied calmly. "I have no idea how you got better and I don't want to know. I'm just grateful it happened."

"Diseases don't care if you're grateful!" Felix shouted. "There's a reason this happened and it's not because God's pissed at you or any of your self centered moralistic theories."

"Let go of me," Alec said, and Felix realized he was shaking the other vampire. He released his shoulder. He raised his hands up, his frustration only slightly alleviated by his giddy thought.

_He's grateful._

"I really don't know," Alec repeated, softer.

"It's fine," Felix said. _Perspective_, he repeated to himself in a mantra. "This wouldn't be the first medical breakthrough that happened by accident. What do you want to do now? Go up to Switzerland?"

"No." Alec hissed, then calmly stated. "I don't know if they're still up there. The phones went out days ago."

"Are you sure? Let me see." Of course Felix could not take his word for it. Alec handed the phone over anyway. Felix hit the redial button and met with emergency tone.

"Hmmm." He punched the power button off and on, then started pressing buttons at random, as if that would jig the phone into working. None of the attempts were successful. "Piece of shite." He started to crush it, but Alec rescued it.

"Someone could fix the signals," he reasoned.

"What are we supposed to do in the meantime?" Felix whined.

"You could read a book," Alec offered.

"You serious."

"Half." Alec assumed a smirk. "Who knows? You might learn something."

That deserved a tackling. Felix took off and plowed Alec to the ground. The soft clay soil sloshed under them. Alec put up a belated defense, flipping Felix onto his back. Felix landed on the backpack; whatever was inside was squashed flat. Felix rolled to his side and flung his arm out around Alec's waist. His other hand clenched over his butt.

Alec froze.

"You've gotten scrawny," Felix whispered, his lips tickling at Alec's ear.

Alec twisted out of his grasp. A back whip of his arm pressed Felix on to his back. Alec sat on him, holding him down by his collarbone.

"Scrawny?" For a moment the resemblance to his volatile sister was clear.

"Okay. Okay. I take it back." Alec released the hold on his neck. Felix did not want to finish the game. He was too charged. He took advantage of Alec's laxness and slammed him onto his side. Cupping the other vampire's chin, Felix brought his head forward and kissed him.

It was dark when they finally stopped.

Both of them were wiped emotionally.

"At least Sabina didn't interrupt this time," Felix said.

"Yeah. How dare she enter her own house," Alec replied wrily.

"When did you get a sense of humor?"

"Dunno. When did you get smart?"

Felix turned his head to his side. "You said I was always smart."

"You remember that?"

"I flitted in and out."

Alec shifted, fitting under Felix's crooked arm.

"Did you really hate being part of the Volturi?" Felix asked.

"I never hated it," Alec corrected. "And Jane was happy there. She deserves to be happy."

"So you would just stay at some place where you weren't happy, just because it was what Jane wanted?"

"Yes. I didn't have anywhere else to go anyway."

"You could have defected like Carlisle and started your own coven."

"I don't want my own coven."

Felix's finger traced against Alec's collarbone "Then what do you want?"

Alec shrugged his free shoulder. "What about you? Why did you join the Volturi? If you don't mind my asking."

"Why would I mind?" Felix sounded puzzled. "I joined because Volterra was the center of the vampire world. I wanted to be a part of it, become a bigshot and influence things."

"You liked having cater to Aro's approval?"

"There's always some give and take. Aro was not that bad."

"He wasn't," Alec echoed.

"You and Jane practically had him in your pocket."

Alec stretched out, scooting slightly away from Felix. Felix sensed he said something wrong, and chased it with "I didn't mean it that way."

"I know."


	25. Chapter 25

The next morning Alec was sitting at the opposite side of the road. But that probably had something to do with the pile of rats Felix had gathered for his meal.

"You sure you don't want one?" he called out, waving the flayed rat corpse.

"I'm sure."

"I'll bring some along, in case you change your mind. I can put them in Chloe's sandwich bag."

"Please don't."

He would anyway. Alec could not have had more than three full meals since he left Switzerland, and it was beginning to show. His clothes draped loosely on his body and hollows were forming under his eyes. Yet when Felix first mentioned hunting, Alec had shot a stern look at him, and declared in his prim little voice, "I am not eating rats."

He would soon, though. Felix would convince him one way or another.

"So rats are good enough for me but not for you?" Felix teased.

"Just hurry up and finish."

Felix shook his head sorrowfully. So much progress undone, because of a couple of rats. He knealt down, rummaging for that sandwich bag.

_It always came back to the rats._

Felix froze, cursing himself for not thinking of this before.

"Felix?" Alec sped across the road to him, his phobia supplanted by a fear that Felix's illness had resurged. He patted at the other vampire's hunched back.

Shooting to a stand, Felix declared, "Never been better." A broad smile developed over his face. He planted a rat-tainted kiss on Alec, then sat him down. "I figured it all out. The rats are the answer."

"To what?" Alec's fist hovered over his lips. He had not wiped his lips, but he was clearly resisting the urge.

"To why you didn't get sick. The rats have some kind of immunity to the disease. They must have passed it onto you when you . . ." Felix could not find a graceful way to conclude that sentence. "I think it was the rat blood that cured me. Chloe's blood might have contributed as well, since she was immune. She had a pet rat, remember?"

Alec looked less that thrilled at this revelation - not that Felix could blame him. "The survivor I found in Popoli - the two year old - had rat bites on her. Chloe lied and said it was a scratch from her playpen but I would know a rat's teeth marks look like."

"Exactly." It made perfect sense to Felix. If the child was left alone in the playpen for days, she might have been hungry enough to grab a rat that was unfortunate to run within her reach. Two year olds were daring eaters; unlike an older human, a two year old would not have given a second thought to fact that she was eating a rat. The rat would have bitten her when it struggled to get out of her determined grip.

Felix did not plan on sharing these details, though. Alec already understood the connection.

"So rats are the cure," Alec repeated, a wave of distaste apparent on his face.

"Part of the cure at least. There might be more to it."

"Like what?"

"You tell me."

Alec stared down at his hands.

Felix hated to ask for this, he really did. He did not want to hear about how those medieval bastards hurt Alec any more Alec wanted to share it.

He shifted closer, closing his hand over Alec's arm. Alec jerked slightly but did not pull away.

"Please," he pleaded. "It might be important."

For a moment he thought Alec would refuse. He had already decided he was not going to press if Alec refused. Saving the world be damned.

"You promise you won't tell anyone?" Alec said, not meeting his eyes.

"I promise." In an attempt to lighten the atmosphere, he reasoned, "Who is there to tell anyway. There's Jane and Demetri and Jane already knows - "

"No, she doesn't," Alec corrected. His vehemence died as he added, "Not all of it."

"I won't tell them." At that point Felix made that vow less because he needed the information than because it seemed important to Alec that Jane never find out.

He waited for Alec to give another protest or a stalling tactic. Instead Alec launched into his explanation.

"A few months before we were killed, I was arrested. When I wasn't being interrogated, they kept me in an underground cell, chained to a wall. Jane later told me I was gone thirty-seven days. I was given just enough food and water to keep me alive and I never saw sunlight.

"The sheriff was a sadistic man. He and his cronies repeatedly told me they would not let me die until I told them what they wanted to know. About Jane. They made up stores about what they would do to her if I died or tried to escape, so I did my best to stay alive without giving them what they wanted. I did okay until they put the rat cage on me."

Alec paused. Felix did not prod him on. His complexion looked green.

"I don't know what happened then. One minute the rats were swarming and chewing into me and the next I was waking up outside in a snowdrift outside the jail, naked and bleeding badly. I remembered what the deputies had threatened and so I rushed home. I pounded on the door to our house and she answered. Once I saw she was unharmed, I passed out again.

"She brought me inside. Jane knew things about herbs and she was friends with a woman who worked as a healer. By the time I healed enough, the sheriff came back and charged us both with practicing witchcraft and we were put to the stake. And you know the rest."

Felix, not quite recovered from his white-hot shock and anger at these experiences, struggled to articulate the least damaging aspects of this information.

"Jane wanted to be a healer?"

"Sort of," Alec answered, emotionless. "Not like Carlisle. More that she wanted to do something with her intellect and there weren't a lot of options for her back then. Henrietta was very kind to her, and we did not get a lot of kindness."

The logical part of Felix's mind wheeled forward. "The herbs she used. What were they?"

"She never told me. We never talk about it," Alec stressed.

But Felix bet it was on their mind all the time. Jane's as well as Alec's. Jane's unnaturally protective attitude of Alec became clearer. She was acting not out of incestuous lust, like Heidi had claimed, but out of guilt and fear. She must have blamed herself that her ambition had almost cost Alec his life. Though it was not her fault; it was the fault of those backward idiots.

He did not yet understand why Alec did not want Jane to know about his time in that jail. Maybe he did not want to alarm her, but there was no reason for her to be alarmed. Those torturers were long dead: put through long and excruciatingly painful deaths, if he remembered the tales right.

He climbed up. "Then let's go ask her."

"You promised you wouldn't tell her," Alec reminded him stonily, not moving from his place on the ground.

"I won't. But there's no reason you can't ask her. She can't have forgotten all the knowledge she accrued through her life."

"Felix," Alec repeated as if he had not heard him. "She cannot know."

Exasperation took over. "What exactly are you protecting her from? She probably already knows about the rats if she fixed your wounds. She doesn't have to know anything except how she saved you -"

A sudden numbing jolt hit him and he collapsed, insensible to everything.

Alec was working up the courage to let Felix back up. What he did was unforgiveable.

He heard a strange bleeping. After a couple of repetitions he recognized the sound as the cell phone.

_Jane_.

He lunged for the backpack and wrenched the phone out.

"Jane?" he asked.

"Alec?"

The voice that replied was too weak, too defeated. It could not be Jane.

"What happened?" he asked. He wanted to ask if it really was her. His mind clung to those doubts, but at the same time he did not want to learn.

"Demetri has it," the voice said. "One of the people we ate . . . it spread so fast, Brother."

"Are you still in Geneva?" When she did not answer right away, he called her name, desperate to keep her conscious. "I can get over there. If there is any uninfected blood around, drink it."

"No. There's nothing . . ."

"Jane, stay with me." He rested his hand on a rock, which ground into powder under the force of his fist. Why did he have to be so far away from her? Was there enough time to get there?

Felix, released from his numbing spell by Alec's distraction, sat up.

"Stay with me. Are you still in Geneva?" he pleaded.

Her hoarse whisper was barely audible. "I'm so very sorry."

The phone went dead.


	26. Chapter 26

At the same moment, Felix slammed into Alec, smashing the phone to pieces. This time he was not playing.

"You ass," Felix raged. He gripped Alec's bony shoulders, a sliver away from smashing them in. "How dare you do that? I was trying to help."

His anger dissipated fast because he realized Alec was not fighting back.

He heard a crunch. Alec's arm bent under him. "Oh shit!" He grabbed the backpack and dumped out all the stuff Chloe had collected. The book _City of Ember_ had escaped damage so Felix used that to align Alec's arm back into place and wrapped it with the roll of bandages.

"It doesn't matter," Alec said hollowly. "She's dying."

"But she's not dead yet." Felix returned to the backpack. He squeezed out the leftover rat blood in the thermos lid and thrust it at Alec's chin. "Drink it, damnit. Then we're going to Geneva."

Alec did not dare protest. He grasped the thermos lid with his uninjured hand and drank.

They did not talk. Talking would have slowed them down and they could not afford that. Felix stopped only to gather more rats for Jane and Demetri. Alec collected some too, numbing them, of course, before he dared touch them. He worried that there would not be enough for Jane and Demetri in that small sandwich bag. To make room for them, they discarded the useless items (like the beauty items Chloe had stocked up.)

They easily bypassed the barricades: first to Switzerland and then to Geneva. On entering the canton, they saw their first live humans since Chloe. The humans tried to protect themselves with Hazmat suits and masks, but they all smelled of disease. The vampires did not stick around long enough to be spotted.

Felix located the hotel that he had left all those weeks ago. The door was unlocked and unguarded. He led Alec into the lobby, where one figure occupied the bar counter at the far end, away from the glass windows. Alec immediately recognized the figure and rushed over to her.

Jane laid her head on the counter, her eyes closed, her long arm stretching across the countertop. When Alec approached her, her eyes fluttered open and her pale lips parted.

"Jane," he greeted softly.

"You shouldn't be here," she slurred.

He lifted her up, draping her head on his shoulder and folding her legs over his almost healed arm. She felt lighter. Frail. Even her embrace of him slid down ineffectually.

"Where's Demetri?" he asked.

"Our room."

"I know where it is," Felix volunteered, honorably sparing Jane the exertion of directing them to her quarters.

Jane's yellow-rimmed eyes landed on Felix. "I'll kill you," she threatened.

"Yeah, yeah," Felix said, feeling more sympathetic for her than scared, if all she could manage was that artless threat. Usually she added some specific gore.

They climbed up two flights of stairs and then burst into Demetri's room, where Demetri lay on top of the rumpled bed covers. Alec lowered Jane next to him. He tuned out Felix's quick preparations with the backpack full of rats, cutting them open and squeezing them into glasses from the cabinet.

"Listen Jane," Alec said, placing his hand on her cold cheek. She tilted her head to face him. "We're going to try something that will make you feel better. It might taste a little strange but I need you to drink it anyway." He knew Jane absolutely hated animal blood and he hoped she would not spit it out like a child refusing medicine.

Felix handed Alec the glass, knowing better than to try to administer the blood himself. "I'll get Demetri," he offered.

Jane's head instinctively yanked back from the glass.

"Please Jane."

Her face twisted in disgust, but her vigor for a fight quickly waned. "For you," she relented.

She swallowed the blood as he dribbled it between her lips.

Felix finished with Demetri's feeding. "How long?"

"I don't know." Alec made no move to rise from his perch at the side of their bed.

"There are a lot more survivors here," Felix said. "Though whether they are immune or just not sick yet remains to be seen."

Alec showed no interest in the survivors.

"I suppose you're going to stay here," Felix guessed, feeling like he was talking to himself.

"Is that okay?" Though the words inflected like an actual question, Felix avoided the trap of thinking his opinion counted.

"Not up to me, is it?"

"I'd rather stay here," Alec deigned to explain. "I owe her."

An alarming ripple of realization set off in Felix. He suspected the pattern that was to come. The Witch Twins were back to their freaky inseparable selves, and he had just received the brush off.

He tromped out of the room.


	27. Chapter 27

Demetri recovered first. He reacted with disinterest in seeing Alec. "Oh, you're back," he acknowledged before turning to Jane, caressing her hair in an overly intimate fashion.

"You think maybe you could wait until she's awake before you start that again?" Alec said.

Demetri chuckled. "You know, maybe if you got someone for yourself, you wouldn't have to micromanage Jane's love life."

"I'm awake," Jane murmured. She heaved herself up so she was face to face with Demetri.

After sharing a silent appreciative moment with her lover, she flipped over to Alec and flung her arms around him. "And my brilliant brother," she praised. "You saved us."

"Actually, Felix did," Alec admitted, a bit ashamed. If it had been left up to him, Jane would have died. Again. "He figured the whole thing out."

"Oh, he did?" Jane's happiness faded.

"Good for him," Demetri declared. "Time he finally used his smarts for something other than euphemisms for the sack."

Jane pensively reclined back on the bed. Demetri rubbed her shoulders. Alec was relieved he was not completely oblivious to the sudden descent of her mood, even if he could not define the source of it. Strangely - frustratingly - neither could Alec.

Jane asked coldly. "What exactly did Felix figure out?"

Felix announced his presence. "If you don't mind," he stated enigmatically. "I need to speak to Jane alone."

"Why?" Demetri spoke. He looked to Alec, expecting Jane's brother to chime in with his suspicions, and was confused when Alec merely rose. Meeting Felix's eyes, he conveyed his assent.

As he passed by, he said, too softly for even the other vampires to overhear, "Please don't volunteer more than you have to. For her sake. Not mine." Then he swept out to the hall.

"It's okay, Demetri," Jane said sweetly, as Demetri still postured at her side. "I can handle him."

Demitri parted, his face still creased with worry and confusion.

Felix hoped, if he was to get the information he needed, neither of them charged back in here when they heard his screaming.

Felix did not get farther than two words into a pleasantry about her improved health when she sent a painful shock on him.

"You bastard," she hissed, rage quickly refuelling her energy. "I tried so hard to help him forget and you ruined it!"

She sent repeated shocks, each one ripping into him after his screams lessened from the last one. When she finally released him, he lumbered back up.

"You really thought he'd forget?" he said through clenched teeth. There was protectiveness and then there was insanity. It had been over seven hundred years, for Lucifer's sake! She let him suffer in silence for over seven hundred years because of her delusions that she alone could protect her brother from the bad, bad world.

"I don't know how you tricked him into telling you," she said, keeping her voice low out of consideration for Alec and Demetri, "but you have no right to pretend you know anything about us."

_Here we go with the 'us'. _

"I know that that blather about the Black Death was not the real reason you were determined to send me to Volterra," Felix revealed. "Maybe you didn't know that the virus could affect vampires. But that was not the reason you were worried. I notice how you did not volunteer Demetri to go there, and you could not go yourself without Demetri demanding explanations. But I was expendable."

Jane pasted a false smile on her face, though her newly amber eyes flashed menacingly. "That's a nice conspiracy theory," she cooed. "I didn't exactly have to force you to go, though. You were ready to gallop out there yourself. It makes me wonder what could have spurred your conscience."

"We're talking about you," Felix protested. "You knew about this disease. You might not have known whether vampires could be infected but you knew Alec wouldn't be infected. He had it before, didn't he? When he was still alive. The rats transmitted to him in prison."

Shock.

"You will not mention that time again," Jane growled. She knealt over him. "Not to me and especially not to him."

She poised, ready to deliver another one. Felix recovered more slowly this time. He rubbed his head.

"I need to know how you cured him."

"You already have a cure."

"For vampires, not humans," he argued. "Surviving this virus does us no good if our food source goes extinct. Would you rather have Demetri and Alec starve to death than remind Alec of some bad memories he hasn't forgotten?"

He anticipated the next shock, which she delivered.

"You think this is a trivial matter?" she whispered, her emotions annihilated under her fury. She yanked his head back, digging her bony fingers into his scalp. "So fucking easy for you to force him to relive his worst experiences for your own curiosity, isn't it? You weren't there. I'm the one who found him near death on my doorstep. I'm the one who dug those charred rat corpses out of his wounds and sat up with him when he woke up screaming that they were crawling around inside of him."

She released him, her fury slowly receding, and closed her eyes. Willing herself back into a calm state, Felix suspected, before Alec or Demitri discovered her. Her shoulders loosened, almost as if her outburst had served a catharsis she had not had for centuries.

"Leave my sight," she ordered, as she rocked back to a stand. She paced away from him, peering out the small square window.

"Jane," Felix persisted. When she did not respond, he scrambled up and tapped on her shoulder. She whirled to him, and he flinched, expecting another pain burst.

"What?" she said, her voice still flat.

"I need the cure."

"You're a fucking pest." She turned back to the window. "I'll think about it."

Felix had to accept that would be the best he would get for now. He opened the door to find Demetri straining to listen in.

"What happened?" Demetri asked. Jane had made her threats in a low voice so that no one outside the thickly walled room could hear.

"Better if she explains it," Felix decided aloud. "Where's Alec?"

"Downstairs. The lobby."

Alec had found a pocketknife (no better place in Switzerland to get a new knife, Felix mused to himself) and was switching the blade in and out. He glanced up when Felix entered the room.

"She said she'd think about it," Felix informed him.

"Okay," Alec said slowly. He was not entirely sure why Jane had to think about it.

Felix checked the windows. The sun would set in about an hour, then he would head out to scout for survivors.

"Listen," Alec said. Felix turned his head. "Thank you for coming here to save them. I know you weren't exactly eager to help us after . . . that you probably tempted just to save Demitri and leave Jane to-"

"I wouldn't do that," Felix declared. It had never crossed his mind. Jane was part of his coven and if she needed help, he would help her.

"I know." Alec put down the knife and closed his fingers together. "I know you wouldn't. I'm sorry I pissed you off earlier, even if you're not the type to hold it against me."

Felix leaned closer to him "You know what they say about makeup sex," he purred.

Felix wrapped his arm around Alec.

After a lost minute or so Alec pulled away from Felix's groping his thigh. "We can't do it now."

Felix frowned. "Why? Because of Jane?" he whined.

"And because you're trying to get something from her," Alec reminded him. "It wouldn't be to your benefit if she discovered us like this."

"You have a point," Felix said, with pained resignation. "We'll hold off, then." He could only take a little satisfaction that Alec did not seem any more pleased with the arrangement than he was.

"You will tell her eventually, right?" Felix asked, before he could push back the words.

Alec honestly had not thought that far ahead. Until a half an hour ago, he had wrested with the idea he could lose Jane to the virus. This, however, he could bear. If she refused to speak to him ever again, that would be acceptable. She had Demetri and she would be fine. That was all he would ask of her.

"Yes," he answered. "I'll tell her."


	28. Chapter 28

He did tell her, later that night, after Felix had enlisted Demetri into searching for human survivors.

Alec had a new sympathy to Jane's attempt to explain about her and Demetri. Though he did not have Jane's hot temper, he had not taken the news as graciously as he could have.

Already Jane set into her predictable rage. "I'll kill him. I'll rip off his eyelids and smelt his spine into jewelry."

"Jane-"

"Is this why you left? Because of him?"

"Part of it," Alec admitted.

"I should have known," Jane moaned. "If I hadn't been so wrapped up in Demetri I would have known something was wrong."

"Nothing was wrong. I just needed some time to think. I didn't know how to act after . . ."

"After he kissed you with his whorish mouth."

"You're disappointed," Alec guessed.

"No." Jane brought her arms around him into a tight hug. "No. Please don't ever think that. You are happy with him, aren't you?"

"Yes." If he could, Alec would have blushed. "I love him."

"Why? He's not very bright."

"Yes he is."

"Well," Jane twisted her mouth into a cautious smile. "I suppose he could be worse." Which was Jane's version of acceptance.

Alec said, "I'm sorry I gave you a hard time about Demetri."

Her smile broadened. "Were we obnoxious?"

"Very." Alec played along, as Jane clearly angled for recognition of her wickedness. She had a tendency to take a strange pride in misbehaving.

"Until the virus came, we had a lot of fun," Jane beamed. "You should have fun. You haven't had any fun since . . ."

She faltered there, aware she breached the unspoken rule of never mentioning that time.

He had not planned on bringing this up. But the subject was there and he could not bear another seven centuries of this hanging over them. Lately it seemed to do more harm than good.

"I confessed," Alec told her.

"What?" Jane asked, her smile dropping in confusion.

"That's why Sheriff Ryggs let me go," he told her, trying not to snap his eyes away from hers. "Because I confessed."

Jane sank back down onto the bed. "What did you confess to?" she asked, hushed.

"I don't remember. Whatever he wanted me to confess to. He made a lot of ridiculous claims about us."

The quilt of the bed rent under her clenched hands.

"That asshole," she said slowly. "Eternal torture would be too good for him."

She had not yet realized his betrayal of her; she was too focused on Ryggs.

"He had already told me that," Jane said. "Before we were put to the stake. But I suspect he was lying. Trying to divide us. He might have lied to you too."

"I hope so, but I can't be sure."

"Alec," Jane ground out through her white teeth. "It wasn't your fault. I was the one who thumbed their stupid morals in their fat faces. They should have never involved you."

She got up to smash the writing table and chair to splinters. Alec merely waited for her to finish, as such displays of temper were far from unusual. Jane could go through several sets of furniture in her room through the course of a year.

Jane knealt on the bed, overlaying her hands over his

"Remember when I chiseled out all of his teeth?" she said.

"Yes." Alec replied.

"We broke his arms and legs into little bitty pieces. You wrapped that strap with the glass shards around his neck. He was pleading to us. Crying like a pathetic puddle of mush. And we had not even used the hot irons on him." Jane let in an evil grin. "Yet."

"We left him there while we killed the others," Alec picked up the story. "So he would have to wait. When we returned, he had soiled himself and was muttering incoherently."

"We left him alive in the burning village," Jane echoed, relishing those memories of when they finally defeated their lifelong tormentor.

The ironic part is that Alec had held back on repeating some of the tortures he had learned that year. He and the Volturi - the monsters - had had boundaries they were unwilling to cross. Ryggs had had none.

Contrary to legend, they did allow some of the villagers to live. Some of the poorer families. The other prisoners who were subject to Rygg's punishments. Henrietta had already been killed by the same mob who had dragged Alec and Jane out of their home that fateful day. Jane had set a gravestone for Henrietta in Volterra, though the gravestone marked no body.

They had no need to fear Ryggs. That man had disintegrated long ago.

Felix and Demetri returned to find them sitting on the bed, facing each other as if performing a ritualistic game.

"Everything okay?" Demetri asked. Felix had already confessed the true reason Felix pulled him out of the hotel, and though Demetri was fine with the news (why shouldn't he be?; he had no stake in what Felix and Alec did), he did worry a little about Jane's reaction, given the events earlier that day.

"Just splendid," Jane replied, smiling. She straightened her legs, beckoning Demetri to her.

Felix rolled his eyes to the side. _Come on_, he silently urged Alec. _You promised._

With a short huff, Alec ascended from the bed. "I'll leave you two alone."

"Oh, one more thing." Jane bounced up, plucked a folded paper from the wreckage of her writing table, and handed it to Felix.

"Ah, your invaluable input," Felix expressed in gratitude.

He followed Alec out of the room. While heading to the opposite side of the hotel, he unfolded the paper and read it.

Here is the concoction Henrietta taught me. I hope it works, because those rats taste bloody awful.

P.S. If you hurt my brother, I will shove a rod down your throat and have your fellow countrymen play your organs like bagpipes.


	29. Chapter 29

New cracks had formed in the ceiling. In the past few days, the hotel building had acquired a lot more history.

Well, Felix smirked, he had always wanted to make his mark on history.

"What?" Alec asked from a couple of inches away. Which meant that Felix had finally beaten Alec at this ridiculous challenge.

"The Duracell Duo finally stopped," Felix reported, aware that the vibrations that usually accompanied their vigorous activity had ceased.

Alec sighed like he was too mature for this subject and stood up to scout the lobby for a book. His sister's sexual life still was not one hundred percent kosher for discussion.

Jane and Demetri trooped downstairs.

"You look worn out," Felix greeted boastfully.

"Shut up," Jane said, joining Alec at the bookshelf.

"What about you?" Demetri asked, returning the offense. "You wore out much more quickly. Don't tell me the infamous sex guru couldn't keep up with the novice."

Alec and Jane frowned their spooky identical frowns at Demetri.

"Haha." _Sucks to be him_, Felix thought. Unwilling to share the proverbial doghouse with his friend, he simply explained, "I'm waiting for a phone call."

"Who would call you?" Jane asked, with mild interest.

The replaced cell phone made its timely ring.

"And that would be it." Felix peeled himself off the floor and answered. "Hullo? Yes, I thought you would be interested in my offer."

"It's Carlisle," Alec explained to them.

"Carlisle," Demetri echoed.

Jane wrinkled her face. "Uggh. They would survive the plague."

She should not have been too surprised. Since the Swiss people replaced communications, the group had learned that the Americas had only suffered a forty percent mortality rate so far: most of the causalties concentrated in the largest cities. Which was a vast improvement over the over ninety five percent death toll in continental Europe.

"Why is Carlisle calling?" Demetri wanted to know.

"Because Felix called him," Alec provided the obvious reason.

"Why? We're not going to join up with them." Demetri's voice rose in outrage at the possibility

Alec shook his head. "It's only because Carlisle is a doctor. Professional interest."

"I already released it locally, numbnuts!" Felix shouted indignantly. "But knowing how your country likes to slow everything down with tests, I thought I'd send some your way. You know, so you and your family don't die?"

For a human lover, Carlisle was terrible at showing gratitude.

"Now I want a few things in return. Don't worry, it won't cost you your souls. First I want your assurance that your coven will not retaliate for any past deeds. I'm not offering you a life saving elixir just to have you gang up and kill off my coven."

"Your coven?" Jane shrilled.

"Jane's coven," Felix corrected, rolling his eyes. "And that also goes for hunting rights. There's not that many of us, so it's not like we'll be taking a huge chunk of the population." A pause. "Of course, we'll stay away from the rez and any other sacred spots. And no fair declaring the whole continent a sacred spot.

"Third, any money you make, a third of it has to go to the surviving family of Chloe Engleby, because there wouldn't be a cure without her." Felix provided the address.

"So," Felix finished with an airy confidence he well deserved. "Do we have a deal?"


End file.
